Lovehammer Collection
by drakensis
Summary: A collection of short stories and snippets I wrote for the Lovehammer crossover. Warning, mood varies from the dark to the very silly.
1. Opening

**Lovehammer**

**Stories of Sailor Moon &amp; Warhammer 40,000**

_IT IS THE 31st Millenium. Stepping out of the shadows,_  
_the Emperor has guided Mankind from the Earth to_  
_domination of the stars. He is master of humanity through _  
_his ceaseless labours since before the dawn of history _  
_and protector of the galaxy through the might of his _  
_inexhaustible armies. He is the burning sun at the heart _  
_of the Imperium, God in deed if not in word._

_YET EVEN IN his divine status, the Emperor is not alone. _  
_Unstoppable and magnificent, his followers lead mighty _  
_fleets and legions in Great Crusades across the universe, _  
_against the infinite enemies of humanity. At the forefront _  
_of this are the brotherhood of Primarchs: the pinnacle of _  
_genetic engineering, the ultimate masters of warfare and _  
_progenitors of his Space Marine legions. In the name of _  
_their father they have united a million worlds beneath _  
_their banners. Chief amongst the children of the Emperor _  
_is his daughter, the Silver Moon of the Imperium, _  
_Princess Serenity. She is the vessel of all humanity's _  
_hopes and dreams and her court of Senshi tread the stars _  
_beside her brothers: lanterns of civilisation beside the _  
_torches of war._

_TO BE A man in such a times is to stand between _  
_greatness and oblivion. For ten thousand years the _  
_Imperium has teetered between ascencion to greatness _  
_beyond imagining and a long and irreverible _  
_annihilation at the hands of mankind's myriad foes. It is _  
_to live knowing that Gods and Demons walk amongst us, _  
_that every moment battles are fought that will decide the _  
_future of everything, battles waged by both humble _  
_Imperial Guardsman and the great God Machines of the _  
_Adeptus Mechanicum, by the impassioned preaching of _  
_the Ecclesiarchy and by the subtle agency of the Ordos of _  
_the Inquisiton._

_THESE ARE THE tales of those times. Forget the power of _  
_faith and technology, for neither religion nor science can _  
_predict the destiny of man. Forget the promise of _  
_inheritance by the meek, for in the grim dark future there _  
_is only struggle. Mankind is a star ascendant, but how _  
_much further can a star rise before it falls?_


	2. Saga of the Angry One

Astartes: Saga of the Angry One exploded onto Terra's popular media some thirty years after the recovery of the Primarch Angron, aimed at the 15-18 year old audiences (although it proved highly popular with all ages). An independent production that successfully avoided any critical approval, it nonetheless proved financially successful and ran for five seasons. After the first season, rights for retransmission were obtained by the Word Bearers Legion who exported it well beyond the Solar Segmentum and introduced it to the rest of the Imperium in partnership with the Iron Warriors Legion. Tragically the entire production staff were killed by a terrorist attack early in pre-production of season six despite the best efforts of a detachment of the Raven Guard who had rushed to protect them.

Having been re-run somewhere in the galaxy for virtually all of the existence of the Imperium (the fall of High Lord Vandire in M35 is in some degree ascribed to his unusual dislike of the show: it is believed that the show was suppressed for three whole years of his reign of terror and all known copies of episode 3.17 The Angry One Versus Htogrok of Airabrab, AGAIN! are tragically believed to have been destroyed on his orders. The outcry from all right thinking Imperial citizens was titanic.) A:SotAO is undoubtedly the most successful video animation of known history.

Principal characters of the show include, of course, the eponymous Angry One (a thinly disguised Primarch Angron) who is accompanied on his voyages across the Galaxy by his faithful aide Walkuf and of course his loyal and (exageratedly) violent legion of Angry Astartes. Given that all Angry Astartes are always portrayed in full World Eater livery, the disguise is very thin indeed and it was swiftly understood that Walkuf is representative of Captain Kharn of the World Eater's Eighth Company. (Captain Kharn was not only a generous contributor of anecdotes that episodes could be based upon but also provided the Angry One's distinctive voice).

The show's premise is simple: The Angry One, son of the distant (and virtually never seen in the show) Imperator, is possessed by great and terrible rages that endanger everyone around him. However his sister, Tranquility introduces him to Walkuf and suggests that he use his rage for the benefit of all others by subjecting the enemies of the Empire to his righteous wrath. Conveniently for the plot, the Battle Barge _Wrath of the Angry Fury_ (an icon of the show, despite being destroyed fourteen times in the show's 110 episodes) had recently been completed and so the Angry One was able to obtain it, setting out on a quest to liberate lost human worlds from their oppressors and deliver them into the welcoming arms of the Empire.

The typical episode of A:SotAO would feature the Angry One discovering or being directed to a human world oppressed by a xenos species and proceeding to liberate it from said xenos in a violent and bloody fashion before receiving the grateful thanks of the planet and departing once more on his never-ending crusade. There were also occasional multi-episode arcs, one to finish the first season and two per season thereafter, which almost always involved some sinister plot from outside or inside the Empire against the Angry One, over which he would triumph in a violent and bloody fashion.

There were several recurring characters in A:SotAO besides the Angry One and Walkuf. The Angry One's sister, Tranquility, was the most common, very often to direct the Angry One against particular menaces but on two occasions when the Angry One's fury endangered himself, she was able to intervene. Two of the Angry One's brothers were also regularly encountered although the sinister Crow was always at some distance from the Angry One and was a persistent mastermind behind schemes to entrap or shame his heroic (if bloody and violent) sibling. In contrast, the Scythebearer (clearly intended to portray Mortarion) is handsome, noble and always accompanied by his ward Violet (obviously representing a young Lady Persephone Saturn) is a staunch ally and friend to the Angry One.

Besides the Crow, the Angry One's greatest foe is clearly the mighty ork warlord Htogrok of Airabrab. The two faced each other once a season, with the regularity of clockwork, but the wily Htogrok was always able to make his escape. Nonetheless, he was not without redeeming features and in the popular episode 5:09 Revenge Upon the Evil Sunz he even allies briefly with the Angry One to battle another Ork menace although the alliance was short-lived and eight episodes later they were back at each other's throats, to the delight of the fans.


	3. Princess Serenity, Anima of the Imperium

If there was one species in the entire galaxy that Serenity could be said to hate it was Orks.

_The great scimitar swept through the haft of an axe and cut the foe a head shorter in an instant._

She was on record as having failed to find a single redeeming feature in the their society, culture or general psychology. Given that she was unquestionably the most accomplished diplomat in the Imperium, any hopes of engaging in any form of co-operation with Orks had been allowed to die at that point.

_Rounds of lead and crude iron sparked and disintegrated as they struck the psychic field that surrounded her._

Serenity didn't look down on Orks because their lives were nasty, brutal and short. Her deep dislike for them rested upon their nasty tendency to make human lives nasty, brutal and short just by sheer association.

_Raising one hand, she created a great light that turned night into day. Eyes watering to the point of blindness, the foe fell like wheat before a reaper._

A race that attacked humanity was awful.  
A race that preyed upon humanity was terrible.  
A race that willfully suborned humanity into barbarity was unspeakable.

_A champion stepped forth, bragging of how he would defile her body once he had brought her down. She hurled the scimitar, sending it whirling through the air to cut his hand from his wrist before the weapon returned to her hand. Then she beckoned imperiously for him to step forwards to perish._

The planet Kussar's Redoubt, named for the Ork Warboss whose Waagh had seized it centuries before, was a case in point. There had been a substantial human population before the invasion and even now their numbers were smaller but perfectly viable. Unfortunately, the population was not only enslaved by the Orks but integrated with them, existing alongside the servitor subspecies known as Gretchin. Reports suggested that the highest aspiration of any human on the planet was to be large enough and mean enough to be treated like an Ork.

_Where she fought, the men and women stood straighter, pain and fatigue flowing away from them. That was merely her presence. In brief intervals between attacks she walked through the infirmary and where she went, the wounded rose hale to fight once more._

Serenity was supposed to wait for her Father and Brother to arrive with an expeditionary fleet to carry out the invasion. But that would have taken weeks.

_Terrified but more afraid of the masters behind them than of one lone woman, slave soldiers charged at her by the hundred. She stood upon their heaped bodies, raised higher by her own height before they fled her, an indestructible goddess of war._

Military doctrine called for orbital bombardment to precede a landing. But that would have killed thousands of humans alongside the orks.

_Shamen chanted and danced, calling upon their rude deities to give witness to their courage and grant them victory. She erupted in their presence like a newborn star and sent them squealing from her presence as she cast down their idols._

Instead she had identified a defensive position within a day's march of the largest Ork settlement on the planet, brazenly landed there with her guards and defied the Orks to remove her. Predictably, the result had been a swarm of Orks (and Gretchin and humans) towards the position, intent on 'Avin A Go, as their language put it.

_A night attack. Standing shoulder to shoulder with towering giants and grim amazons. Less skill than butchery, the attackers gunned down in the dozens, night no shield against augmented vision, whether mechanical or inborn._

The Orks were armed with crude stubguns and axes for the most part. Serenity's Custodes and Seraphim wore power armour and advanced boltguns. The latter ran out of ammunition days before Orks ran out of bodies.

_The ramparts that had been built now were buried in the dead. Survivors dug out their friends, heaping the enemy dead in new fortifications. Even the soles of her boots were unstained, but every glance at the fallen stabbed at her soul._

The gold armour of the Custodes and the silver armour of the Seraphim were stained black with blood. Only Serenity remained pristine. Untouched.

_Six hulking foes surrounded her. Three cuts that would have made her armsteachers curse and her brother laugh brought down half of them and then she plunged her blade into the ground before raising her voice in a crescendo that sent the others reeling in agony._

For every human life lost as they threw themselves against the barricades, heedless of risk in their obsession to fight along their greenskin brethern, she shed a single sparkling tear.

_Her sword hurtled down only to pause an inch from the flesh of a half-naked boy half her age who was rushing her with no more than a dagger. Before he could realise he had been spared, Serenity reversed her blade and struck a stunning blow to his temple with the flat._

For the Orks she cried not at all.


	4. Primarch Angron

Angron stared at the little procession making their way up the mountain.

He'd expected an assault from the five great armies gathered around the mountain redoubt that he and his followers held out in. It was a given that he would die in that assault - fewer than a thousand of the former gladiators survived and while their fury would doubtless destroy far more than their own number, the armies of an entire world were mustered against them.

Symbolic graves lay behind the positons of Angron's City-Eaters although all knew that their bodies would never occupy them. Doubtless their bodies would be torn apart by the victors for display all across the world, any unfortunates who survived being tortured to death in the great arenas from which they had come.

But what ascended the steep paths was no army and the vast encampments so distant that only his on unmatched vision could make them out bustled not with preparations to attack but instead... to depart?

Perhaps three dozen men and women formed the line snaking their way towards him and none of them were warriors. Some carried weapons, but they were no more than ornaments. Except for the silver staff held by the girl who led them. She was not one of them, he conceded. Every other amongst them he knew by their faces or at least close resemblence to the oligarchs he had seen watching his bouts over the years. The rulers of the world, the absolute apex of power until he had begun his revolt.

But the girl was something else. Her name... his mind wrestled with the unfamiliar language, new to him, that had been spoken by the Emperor and his dog-soldiers. Selene? No. Serene? Almost.

"Serenity." Angron grated the word out and heads turned amongs the little band who stood near him.

"Shall we kill them?"

A red rage rushed through Angron, flooding out doubts. The girl, the Emperor's pampered daughter, had brought before him the fat pigs who'd gloated over his enslavement and who had sent millions to die under his blades while never risking themselves. He raised the swords already in his hands and prepared to descend to meet the girl. She would be the f-

She would di-

He would k-

Angron thought about the gentle silver light that he had seen around her. Not the proud splendour of his 'father', but something equally familiar. There was little gentleness he could recall in his life. Scarcely any at all, in fact.

Snarling viciously, he smashed the swords down on the stones before him, cleaving the rock into three parts. "Not yet." Then his lips curled in dark humour, the brutal jokes of a gladiator his only education in that mode of thought. "Perhaps she's earned a red twist for her triumph rope."

It is said that only once was the Anima to suffer any scar to her sacred flesh. And this too, she ever asserted, was a mark of love.

* * *

There are a number of unstated duties that attach to the role of Primarch's Equerry. Precisely what those duties are depends heavily on the actual Primarch of course. In the case of Kharn, Captain of the 8th Company of the World Eaters Legion, one of them was teaching his Primarch some degree of tact and diplomacy.

"Sister!" Angron called out as he escorted his companion into the Imperial Palace. Courtiers scattered prudently out of the way as the towering figure charged brutally across the mile-wide corridor to sweep up the princess in a bone-crushing hug. Kharn nodded approvingly and quietly called in a medical team for two ambassadors who hadn't quite been fast enough and were now suffering from broken bones. This was a substantial reduction in the usual casualties.

Angron hesitated for a moment, wracking his mind for what came next. "Are you well?" he asked.

"I've very well, Angron," Usagi assured him and kissed his cheek. "How are you."

"I've..." He remembered her polite but excruciating lecture the last time he told her about his skull collection. "I've brought our brother Corax to meet you."

Usagi's eyes flickered to the dark-haired giant who was looking around the palace, pretending not to be impressed. "That's very sweet of you Angron."

The primarch lowered his voice so that the basso rumble could only be heard by everyone in this wing of the Palace. "He was a prison bitch," he confided in a sincere attempt to be discreet.

Kharn removed his helmet and started hitting his face against the nearest wall as Corax glowered and Serenity blushed.

* * *

Serenity smiled down at the little girl who had brought flowers to her. It was a charming custom of the planet for a child to welcome dignatries to the planet and after careful scanning by a small army of techpriests it had been agreed that flowers and child were safe.

"They're lovely," she assured the little girl who seemed just a little intimidated by the hulking Space Marines who were 'reinforcing' her bodyguard of Custodes. The exact Legion that provided the force varied on a complex rota system that she had never quite grasped, possibly because none of her brothers seemed willing to explain it. She would have suspected Horus if it wasn't for the disproportionate representation of the Iron Warriors.

Actually, she suspected Horus anyway.

Serenity hugged the little girl around the shoulders, "Don't mind them," she stage-whispered. "They're just here to look after everyone."

"Weally?" And she lisped! The Anima was strongly tempted to take the girl home with her, but father had drawn that line firmly. Kittens and bunnies, yes. Human children, no. Poo.

"Oh yes." Serenity gestured with one hand, a complex code that detailed in this case exactly which part of her travelling luggage should be brought out. "They're like big brothers. Do you have a big brother?"

"Uh-huh."

"And does he protect you from bad things?"

The girl frowned in concentration. "I don't think he does."

"I'm sure he does really." The bag had arrived and been unzipped so Serenity reached inside and pulled out one of the two dozen plushies inside. They'd been a gift from someone or other who wanted to curry favour (mmm, curry): stuffed dolls decorated like all her known brothers, her father and prominent members of the Imperial Court. Most probably the person giving the dolls had incorrectly guessed her age. This one was wearing the white and blue armour of the XII Legion and carrying two swords. "Here, this is one of my brothers. His name's Angron and he protects me from bad things [I]all the time[/I]. If I had any creepy monsters under my bed... do you ever have monsters under your bed?"

The little girl nodded, eyes wide.

"Well, if any of them tried to get me, he'd smack them good!" Serenity waved the plushie aggressively and then placed the stuffed toy in the girl's arms. "Here, why don't you keep him. That way he can help your brother if he ever has trouble."

A week later stuffed Primarch Angron dolls were the number one gift for little girls in that sector. By the end of the year, the craze had spread to half the planets in the segmentum. Three years later it had reached the other side of the galaxy. A few even reached Eldar Craftworlds although only as items for study and they hardly ever fell into the hands of impressionable Eldar children.

* * *

Everyone knew that there was some kind of tension between the two Primarchs as soon as Mortarion walked into the conference chamber. Then again, it wasn't as if the sudden change in Angron's body language was hard to miss. One moment he was using one finger to idly doodle on a map with red wine spilled from his goblet, the next his fists were clenched and his eyes were locked upon Mortarion.

As soon as the strategy for the coming battle had been decided, Angron shot to his feet. "EVERYBODY OUT!" he roared, hand reaching for the hilt of his sword. "NOT YOU!" he added when Mortarion began to step prudently back from the map table.

"My lord," Kharn asked cautiously. "What -"

"I SAID OUT!"

Kharn's exit from the tent was through a hole in the fabric that hadn't previously existed and it ultimately took thirteen tech-priests to free him from the tangled barrels of a Hydra self-propelled anti-aircraft platform that he'd collided with.

The following conversation was rather muffled to those outside, which didn't stop rumours from spreading through the less responsible members of the headquarters staff.

"What is that!" Angron snarled as patiently as he could manage.

Mortarion twisted his head around to look in the indicated direction, which was over his left shoulder. "This is Persephone. Persephone, this is my brother Angron."

"Not interested in you being a pedo like father! What's she holding?"

The Death Guard's primarch counted to ten. "Persephone, could you fetch me a cookie please. And one for you as well." There was a scrambling noise from his back and the little girl scampered out of the tent, still clutching her plushie Angron under one arm.

"Firstly, brother," Mortarion replied. "That is a toy. Persephone idolises you, as do many children."

Angron's brow furrowed at this strange concept.

"Secondly, do you know what that word means?"

"What, 'toy'? Yes, of course."

"No, 'pedo'."

The other primarch scratched his head. "Not... exactly."

Mortarion explained.

"BY OUR FATHER! HOW DO YOU KNOW THESE THINGS. YOU PERVERSE BASTARD!" roared Angron. "I SHOULD -"

That was when Mortarion punched him in the face. By the time Persephone returned, half the tent had been torn down and Angron, sporting a black eye, had succeeded in breaking his brother's nose. Fortunately, Mortarion had also managed to persuade his brother that he was not, in fact, a 'pedo' and the two Primarchs were sitting on a broken tank (that had been in excellent repair when the girl left) and watching the tech-priests trying to free Kharn.

"Thank you," Mortarion said, accepting his cookie from the girl. He shot a prompting look at Angron when Persephone tenatively produced a third cookie and offered it to him.

"Thanks," replied Angron, who thought one of his teeth might be loose and was pushing at it with one armoured finger. He shoved the cookie into his mouth as Persephone retreated back behind Mortarion and there was a mighty crunch as he bit down.

Mortarion nodded sagely. "Was that one of Serenity's cookies you gave him?" he asked the girl now clutching his calf as Angron yanked a broken tooth out of his mouth and stared at it in disbelief.

Persephone nodded and squeezed her plushie Angron tighter.

* * *

Mortarion eyed his brother Angron warily. The Primarch of the World Eaters had been unusually well-behaved at this gathering, with almost no accidental maimings and for the most part, he had used his 'inside voice' when talking to people. Which still meant he was clearly audible for a mile or so, but it was nonetheless a substantial improvements.

The reason for Mortarion's caution was simple: it was Persephone's birthday and Serenity had quietly but firmly indicated that the girl was due presents from the entire Imperial Palace. For the most part, this had involved a glut of purchases from local lampmakers although Serenity had presented the smaller girl with a long silver glaive. Angron, however, had a large parcel over one shoulder. The parcel was covered in brown paper and appeared to be... moving.

"Angron, what is that?" he asked cautiously.

The towering man lifted it off his shoulders and proffered it, two handed, to Mortarion's ward. "Merry birthday!" he announced proudly, drawing attention from across the vast ballroom.

Persephone cautiously accepted the gift, with Mortarion discreetly taking most of the weight as he lowered it to the ground. There was something alive in there, he realised in morbid horror. However, he allowed the girl to tear at the brown paper, which seemed extraordinarily resilient. After a moment, Persephone seemed to grow frustrated and picked up Serenity's gift, which made short work of the coverings.

There were intakes of breath all around the world as a huge, bat-winged and purple-furred bear was revealed. Then Persephone squealled in delight and threw herself against the creature's chest, hugging it.

Mortarion's voice was chillingly cold. "Brother, is that Cthellean Cudbear?"

"That's right!"

"They're vicious carnivores!"

Angron's pride was undented. "I housebroke it myself," he announced before leaning over and 'whispering'. "I filed down the teeth and claws too, just in case."

Words failed Mortarion, but Persephone was more eloquent and she abandoned her new pet for a moment to hug Angron's armoured calf. "Thank you, Uncle," she murmured and then pulled a small package out of the veritable mountain of gifts. Mortarion had wondered why she had brought a wrapped present to her own birthday aprty but had presumed it had arrived early and she was going to open it with the others. "Happy birthday to you."

The towering primarch bent down and took the gift in one massive hand. "How did you know it was my birthday?"

Persephone blushed and scampered back to her Cudbear,.

Angron and Mortarion exchanged glances. "Is it actually your birthday?" Mortarion asked in surprise.

"Well I always thought it was yesterday," Angron grunted, turning the package over in his hand. "Must have got the calendar wrong." He lifted the present to his face then closed his teeth on the wrapping paper and yanked, tearing a great swathe away. "Hmm."

"It's a lamp, brother."

The primarch turned it over in his hands. "Ah. How does it... work?"

"There should be a switch..."

Angron found the control at that moment and a stabbing beam of light, analogous to a searchlight, slashed out across the room, perfectly illuminating Corax, who was endeavouring to discreetly drop off a present on the pile. Which was odd, because he'd sent his regrets and claimed he wouldn't be able to attend. "Hi Corax."

"...Angron," the goth-inclined primarch replied with forced civility, trying to hide the package behind him. Unfortunately, this failed to protect him from one of Serenity's hugs...

* * *

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Everyone stopped and stared at Angron (Dorn also saluted him, which was a first).

The World Eater Primarch gave them all a look. "What? I heard it in a film," he explained.

"When did you start watching films?"

"When I started dating."

"YOU'RE DATING!" Azmina shrieked, all but teleporting across the room. "TELL ME EVERYTHING!"

* * *

Kharn looked up at the Rhino parked in front of the World Eater lines and slapped one hand across the face of his helmet.

Jaghatai Khan's gift of a warbike to Angron had been heartfelt. Having been specifically sized for the burly primarch it had successful convinced Angron to give the vehicle a try (previous experiments had left his knees pressed up against his chest plate).

The warbike had been a smashing success, leaving a trail of destruction including three ork tanks, an emplaced turret, a three towed artillery pieces, more than seventy power armoured Ork Nobz, itself and both of Angron's legs.

It would be at least a week before Angron could walk unassisted according to the apothecaries. The warbike was beyond salvation.

The notion of sitting out active participation in the current conflict had not been one that Angron was willing to tolerate however and the result was in front of Kharn: a Rhino with one of the cupola hatches specially widened so that his primarch could sit in it, wounded legs protected by the mass of the vehicle while from the waist up he rose out of it like a bizarre centaur.

Hearing the engines roar to life Kharn grabbed a handhold and secured himself to the side of the armoured vehicle.

"DRIVE ME CLOSER!" he heard Angron roar as the Rhino accelerated at the head of a wave of charging World Eaters. "I WANT TO HIT THEM WITH MY SWORD!"

* * *

The Prime Lord of Eskrador stared defiantly at the screen. "My world will never bow to your Emperor, girl," he declared boldly.

Serenity shook her head sadly. "Is there no way I can persuade you? Otherwise I will have to ask my brother to bring your world into compliance. I beg of you, think of the people who will die as a result of your decision."

"I care not if Horus himself besieges our world! We will never surrender!"

"Oh, it won't be Horus," the princess assured him. "The nearest of my brothers is Angron."

The Prime Lord hesitated. "Angron the World Eater? The Angry One?"

"Er... yes." Serenity had to admit her brother did have a somewhat overblown reputation.

"I, uh, saw the cartoon," the Prime Lord admitted sheepishly. "But surely that incident on Ghenna was merely Imperial propaganda."

"Well the cartoon didn't really explain the politics, which were more complicated than they looked. And the violence had to be toned down before it could be shown to children."

"But he..." the noble blanched. He had thought that the bloody finale of that episide was comically overstated. "Um... you mean he really cut the..." he remembered that he was speaking to a lady. "...uh, maimed the city's ruler like that?"

Serenity coloured. "Oh dear. Umm... well technically yes..." This was painting such a terrible image of the Imperium.

"So about that treaty you wanted me to sign... when would be a good time?" Being a vassal to the Imperium would _have_ to be less intrusive to the Prime Lord than what Primarch Angron apparently did to the leadership of human worlds that opposed them.

* * *

There was a tradition for when the Imperial family gathered in any great numbers. It had started with just the Emperor, Serenity and Horus and after centuries it had become an institution that simply could not be avoided (despite efforts by certain Primarchs and Senshi after Angron was recovered and they were exposed to his 'singing'): Music Night.

And so, on this particular evening, with more than half of the Primarchs gathered with their sister and several of her bodyguard at the Emperor's field headquarters, Serenity sang. Horus played the piano. Sanguinius demonstrated heartbreaking skill on the flute. Fulgrim produced a violin to accompany a duet by two of the Senshi. Even Mortarion had grudgingly produced the double bass and scratched out a tune in a competent fashion.

The Emperor dipped his hand inside a bowl filled with tokens and drew the next person's turn. (By longstanding custom it was random order). "Angron," he announced, frowning slightly in disappointment.

Dozens of flinches were concealed with varying degrees of effectiveness. Dorn nudged Corax (who was lurking between the Primarchs of the Ultramarines and Imperial Fists). "Why don't you look bothered?"

"I won a bet with Angron last week," Corax replied coolly. "His forfeit is not to sing for the next month."

Dorn's expression relaxed. "I may hug you."

"Don't let your cousin rub off on you."

Guilleman leant forwards. "I believe this would be a suitable moment to..." He hesitated and held up his fist. "'Fistbump'?"

The other two Primarchs stared at him. "CoughNerdCough," Corax observed.

Guilleman apparently missed the insult. "That would be a no?"

The conversation halted as Angron stepped up to the stage carrying something that sent alarm through the family.

"Is that...?"

"Oh no." The Raven Guard shrank into his chair.

"Corax, I'm going to kill you."

"BECAUSE OF CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES, I CANNOT SING TONIGHT!" Angron announced. "FORTUNATELY I HAVE BEEN LEARNING TO PLAY THE BAGPIPES."

* * *

"ARE YOU DONE YET?"

Perturabo groaned and reached for the headache medicine that Tekhne had packed for him when he was sent out with Angron on this campaign. He'd have to remember to pick up a souvenir for her. "No Angron, not yet."

"OH." The taller of the two primarchs walked from one side of the command centre to the other. Then back. "HOW ABOUT NOW?"

Oh Emperor dammit, why can't he go back to his own command centre and stop harassing me? "No Angron."

Angron grunted disconsolately and walked over to view-slit, stooping so that he could look through it at the fortress they were besieging. Perturabo calculated it would take three more days before his Iron Warriors had created a breach through which the World Eaters could mount an assault.

"You don't think we could just storm it now?" Angron asked hopefully.

"Do you see any breaks in the wall wide enough for you to walk through?"

"Um... there's a gate."

"A locked gate. Trust me, no. I will tell you when it's time. In fact I will give you an advance warning. So why don't you go back to your own Legion and make sure they're ready."

"We're always ready." Angron watched a shell hit the wall with no apparent effect. "That looks like I could go through it."

"It's a crenellation, two hundred metres above the ground. As you are perfectly aware." Perturabo managed through iron determination not to look up from the progress reports. "Stop trying to provoke me to fight you Angron."

Three days later, leading a grand company of the World Eaters in a charge up the breech caused by Iron Warrior tunnelling operations, Angron was startled to hear the chirp of an incoming message from Perturabo.

It would have to be awfully important to send a message right in mid-assault! He sheathed his sword and slowed his stride slightly, allowing a squad to move ahead of him while he activated his vox. "WHAT?"

"Are you done yet?" Perturabo whined theatrically.

Even after Angron closed the channel he swore he could still hear laughter from the Iron Warrior positions.

* * *

"GUILLEMAN!" roared Angron from the entrance of the hall currently occupying the administrative personnel of the Ultramarines Legion.

Said administrative staff could instantly be divided three ways.

The sheep assumed a raging Primarch was charging towards them, intend on mayhem, and tried to hide behind Roboute Guilleman.

The goats recalled that this was Angron's normal speaking voice and rather pointedly did not overreact.

The wise men remembered that Angron was also... careless... about not accidentally damaging people and furniture. They ran for their lives, clutching every dataslate they could sweep up.

Just by entering the room, the primarch of the World Eaters had set Guilleman's staff back a day's work. There was a scraping sound from behind him. Goats being scattered as Angron ploughed uncaring through them on his way towards his brother might have tracked this to a fully armoured Kharn, who was hanging onto Angron's cape, digging his heels in and desperately trying to hold his Primarch back - without noticeable effect.

"How may I be of assistance or education to you, brother?" Roboute asked, not looking up from the dataslate where he was expounding on the vital nature of standardising ammunition clips for Astartes boltguns.

"WHY'D YOU WANT TO BREAK MY LEGION UP!"

"That is not the nature of my proposed programme of reorganisation. The goal is to optimise response times to crises as the management loop of the Imperium grows more extended due to the dilution of available manpower and limits of intercommunication of -"

Angron seized a chair (spilling a cringing clerk out of it) and sat on it. It broke almost immediately so the Primarch reseated himself on the table without pause. It creaked alarmingly. "YOU WANT A THOUSAND ASTARTES IN EVERY SECTOR!"

"That is the preferred ratio," Guilleman agreed, unfazed. He'd been dealing with Angron for decades and this was nothing new.

"I'VE GOT DIBS ON THE SEGMENTUM OBSCURA!"

"You do not have a prior claim on any sector, brother and no administrative authority will be ceded as part of this reassessment of our operational procedures."

"BUT ALL YOUR LEGION'S ASTARTES WILL GET POSTED TO PLACES AROUND YOUR LITTLE ULTRAMARCH EMPIRE, RIGHT?"

Guilleman's eyebrow twitched. "If you are referring to the region of Ultramar, which happens to be under the administration of my Legion just as you could have claimed your homeworld had you so cared to do so -"

"S'RIGHT."

"- I assure you there will be a fair and equitable division of sectors that is in keeping with the strategic needs of the Imperium."

Angron stood up and leant deliberately into Guilleman's personal space. "DIBS. ON. SEGMENTUM. OBSCURA." Then he lowered his voice. "Write it down!"

Guilleman sighed and obediently wrote the words on his dataslate in his usual concise calligraphy. "Is there anything else?"

His brother frowned in thought. "You're getting fat. Go exercise more," he suggested and turned, whipping Kharn (still hanging onto his cloak) around in a dangerous fashion that led to Guilleman's carefully organised desk being spread across a quarter of the hall.

Within seventy-two hours, the Ultramarines Legion was virtually besieged by representatives of planet, system and entire sector authorities from four Segmentums, all insisting that Guilleman guarantee that they would not face the assignment of elements of XII Legion to their respective fiefs. Only the Segmentum Obscure remained relentlessly quiet. One might even say cowed.

* * *

Perturabo had made a special trip of this. It was a rare day of late that he didn't have to spend handling the administration of the Iron Warriors, scattered as they were over a thousand worlds and most of those days involved meticulously planning how to breach fortresses that had stumped one of his brothers.

However, for the first time in four years he'd been able to take a vacation.

Officially he and Tekhne were visiting the World Eaters to deal with the backlog of various documentation and policy decisions that Angron had not returned, might not have read and could conceivably have mistaken for toilet roll at some point in the last decade (in which case Perturabo would provide replacements, much as the idea of delivering soiled reports to Father's clerks amused him). Unofficially, they'd travelled in the luxurious and hardly ever used battle barge that served as his flagship, stopping at any world they fancied.

When they rendezvoused with the World Eaters, Angron had been almost cordial (well by his standards) and invited them along on the freewheeling campaign across rolling hills and sprawling cities to break the defenses of a particularly obdurate group of Slann. Perturabo had gone along with a few dozen of his honour guards, enjoying the mobile warfare he had so little chance to indulge in of late. Tekhne had picked through several captured Slann libraries, having learned the language on the way.

But now it was time for one point of business.

They were sat around a table in the main refractory of Angron's battlebarge. Unlike the usual long tables used by most Legions, Angron favoured small round tables just large enough for four astartes (or two primarchs and one normally-sized woman) as that left optimal room for weapon racks and rising in a hurry.

"Uh, Angron. There's been a complaint from your home world."

"W-ha-T?" the other primarch mumbled around a mouthful of a thick stew that smelt suspiciously like Slann. He swallowed and picked up a pitcher of a noxious looking brew that Perturabo was certain was Mortarion's attempt at reproducing Fenrisian Mjod. Not even the Death Guard would drink it however and there had been a suspicion that Persephone had diplomatically disposed of it. "HAVEN'T BEEN NEAR THE PLACE!" he boomed once he'd washed down the stew.

"I know. But while you chose not to retain control the world, you did lay claim to a mountain range there, didn't you?"

"YEAH. I USE IT FOR STORAGE."

Perturabo picked up a data slate and called up the image that had been sent to him. It showed two mountains of grey granite... and a third that seemed to be made of ivory. "Brother, your skull collection is getting a little out of hand..."

* * *

The assassin crept through the gloomy chambers of the _Extreme Prejudice_ towards his destination.

Electronic and mechanical security devices should have kept him out but they yielded to the devices and in some cases the stolen codes in his possession. Finally the door to the Primarch's bedchamber opened smoothly (what sort of idiot coded his door to open to 1-2-3-4-5?) and the blackclad man moved through it without a whisper of noise.

Angron apparently did not use a nightlight but standby lights from the room's vox shed just enough light that preysight was not required and the assassin slid goggles from his eyes as he crept towards the bed.

It was a gigantic piece of furniture, larger than even someone the size of Angron required, heavy drapes screening it from the rest of the room. Rather than pulling them aside, the assassin dropped to the floor, crawled beneath then and then slid up the side of the bed, minimising the chances of a betraying noise from the curtain.

Long fingers pulled the blowpipe out of a section of harness, already loaded with a dart that had been tipped with lethal poisons sure to kill even one as mighty as a Primarch.

Bringing the blowpipe to his lips, the assassin aimed for the centre of the bed where a shadowy mass betrayed the location of the slumbering Angron. He was just about to exhale when -

FWOOSH!

Flames roared across the bed and into his face, causing him to scream as fire engulfed both assassin and curtains. In the brief instant before his eyes melted, he saw a mass of blonde hair and peering over the woman's shoulder, the irritated face of Senshi Mars. Angron wasn't even in the bed!

After what seemed like an eternity, the flames died and firm hands dragged him out of the tangle of drapes. "How dare you try to assassinate Princess Serenity!" hissed the angry voice of Ira.

"B-but... Angron's rooms?" the agonised assassin muttered, still in shock.

"Angron always lends me his room when I visit," stated the most famous voice in the Imperium, that of the Emperor's daughter, the Anima Serenity. Then a note of steel entered her voice: "You were here to hurt _my little brother_?"

The assassin wet himself.

* * *

Roboute Guilleman had heard occasional rumours that the World Eaters and their brother chapters were rather dismissive of his Codex Astartes. He simply didn't place any weight in those rumours.

Oh, he was certain Angron was putting his own interpretation upon the work but that was understood and quite expected. Not being an imbecile, Roboute had been careful to leave plenty of cracks in the edifice for individualism to thrive. He was fairly sure that more than three-quarters of the Legions were operating within the expected parameters, if not precisely those he had written of.

He had two reasons for believing that the sons of Angron were faithful, if not enthusiastic adherents to proper doctrine.

Firstly, Angron had apparently committed the entire work to memory within a week of being sent an early draft and had maintained a steady correspondence about it, including many suggestions for 'improvements', two of which Roboute had considered worthy of including in the second edition.

Secondly, Chapters derived from the World Eaters would not infrequently request shipments of several thousand copies of the latest edition to ensure they had an ample stock for study and to provide to Imperial Guard and Planetary Defense Force officers near their areas of responsibility. As a gesture of solidarity between the Astartes, Roboute had ordered these be provided at the expense of the Ultramarines chapter.

He would have been genuinely horrified to discover that occasions when these deliveries were delayed were the only occasions that the World Eaters had to provision themselves with conventional toilet paper.

The VIII Legion probably spent more time handling the Codex Astartes than any other Legion. Reading it, not so much.

* * *

Fond as he was of his family - well, some of them - there were some parts of his life that Angron didn't tend to share with them. It wasn't that they were particularly secret, merely the topics that didn't arise often in conversation between his brother Primarchs or that the Senshi presumed wouldn't interest him. Thus, occasional tidbits of informaton had a way of surprising them.

"YOU SHOULD WEAR A HEADDRESS," he advised Serenity on hearing that she would be visiting Seishin II on a state tour.

Fulgrim, Mortarion, Persephone and Ira were present and all directed bemused looks at him. Angron was not usually a font of fashion advice.

"Oh?" Serenity asked. "Ahhh! Seishin was one of your first conquests, wasn't it? Are headdresses a local custom?"

Angron nodded. "IT SHOWS YOU ARE AN UNMARRIED MAIDEN. DON'T LET IT FALL OFF."

"Oh by the Emperor," Kharn moaned. "I'd almost suppressed all memory of that."

Ira's eyes narrowed. "Of what?"

"MY FIRST MARRIAGE."

Fulgrim, having just sipped on a cup of tea proved that even a Primarch's mighty constitution was not well suited to pouring scalded liquid down his windpipe. Persephone's eyes crossed and she went very red in the face.

Mortarion looked at his hulking brother and sighed wearily. "No, don't tell me, let me guess. Removing a maiden's headdress is the local marriage ceremony. You did so by accident and Kharn persuaded you to play along so as not to cause a scene."

Angron nodded. "AMAZING. THAT'S ABSOLUTELY RIGHT. HOW DID YOU GUESS?"

"It was worse than that," Kharn muttered.

"Go on," Serenity ordered when it was clear that the equerry was sinking into melancholy silence.

He groaned. "For one thing, she was the local potenate's daughter. Both her brothers were killed in the invasion and she tried to assassinate Lord Angron at the surrender ceremony with a small calibre stubpistol. We -" he broke off, wrestled with honesty and lost "- I thought that killing her might prevent her father from surrendering and prolong the war so I suggested just restraining her."

Angron picked up Ira - who squawked indignantly - and pinned her casually under his arm. "SO I DID THAT, A BIT LIKE THIS." Ira started trying to kick him. "YES, SHE DID THAT TOO. SO I GAVE HER A SWAT -" a _look_ from Serenity persuaded him not to do that to Ira "- AND HER HEADDRESS FELL OFF."

"You accidentally married someone who tried to assassinate you?"

Angron nodded and looked over at Kharn. "WHAT HAPPENED TO HER AFTER THAT?"

"We assigned her quarters at the other end of the battlebarge, Lord Angron. I believe she had four children by way of one of the crewmen and one of her grandchildren was recruited into the Legion."

Serenity removed her shoe, for lack of a less lethal projectile, and threw it at Angron. "That's terrible!" Then she glared at him. "And didn't you say _first_ marriage. Implying a second?"

Kharn started to weep.

* * *

It was a clash of titans. Red against black. Superhuman flesh and bone against it's own mirror.

Azmina had pressed one fist between her lips and was gnawing absently upon her knuckle to keep her silence.

Oiled, slippery skin gave no purchase as the two men wrestled their way across the floor of the training hall.

Thora's hands were covering Persephone's eyes. She was sure that her face must be glowing sufficiently to betray their vantage point the minute anyone looked for them.

Angron's shoulders hit the floor, hard enough to dent it. A knee crashed against his hip, pinning him and two black hands closed upon his. He could feel hot breath against his face.

At the back of the little group, Ira affected to be unconcerned. She preferred more... intellectual pursuits. This crudity simply wasn't to her taste. And any hastening of her breath was merely due to the unnecessarily high temperature in the compartment.

They rolled, Angron twisting with the experience of years to bring Vulkan beneath him. The mighty Primarch of the Salamanders had little leverage but his mighty muscles forced him upward nonetheless against his brother.

Serenity squeaked excitedly, drawing gazes from all those in the room. In answer to the accusing looks from the Senshi, she indicated Vulkan's loincloth that had for some reason gone astray.

"WELL SPOTTED," Angron boomed and lifted the garment, handing it to Vulkan. "COVER YOURSELF BROTHER, THERE IS A CHILD PRESENT."

"Shall we call it a draw?" suggested Vulkan.

There were groans from certain unnamed Senshi.

The two Primarchs shook their heads and proceeded to start wiping off the olive oil. Neither had considered before that their sister and her court might have an interest in traditional wrestling forms.

* * *

For once the Legion of Angron was a solemn group.

No ships traversed the Warp.

Astropathic communications were neither sent, nor heeded.

Solemnly, thousands of World Eater Astartes gathered around hundreds of hololiths near objectives across half the galaxy. Some of them carried little flags. Others wore simple, brightly coloured tabards over their armour and glared at those with differing colours.

Eldar Farseers across the galaxy shivered and made sure that none of their people were in the vicinity. Other precognitives felt the unease, which led to no small amount of caution by the enemies of the Imperium.

Magnus the Red teleported into Angron's command centre, dragging a protesting Leman Russ behind him. Sailor Mars joined them shortly afterwards, curling up next to the progenitor of the Thousand Sons on an overstuffed armchair.

And in remote corners of battle barges, strike cruisers and other vessels, a very small number of Astartes made joyous preparations for war.

They were the Librarians of XII Legion.

They were the Legion's astropaths, their navigators, their predictors and their counsellors of the uncanny.

There weren't very many of them and they were ferociously overworked. Cloistered and burdened with duties that kept them from the battlefield, something that frustrated all true sons of Angron.

But they always had their hopes and aspirations, centred upon one ritual enacted by their caring and compassionate Primarch. One day, THE day, when they could go out and play. One day every year when they could prove to the rest of the Legion that they - Were - Still - WORLD EATERS!

Dozens of Astartes Librarians left their bases and ships by boarding torpedo or Thunderhawk only if teleportation wasn't an option. Hololiths lit up and thousands of World Eaters leant forwards like the eager sports fans that they were.

Within moments the blood of the enemies of Mankind flowed as the geeks, nerds and freaks of Angron's Legions began to kill them.

Kill them with their MINDS!

* * *

It took more than an hour for Jaghatai to find his brother.

He was honestly surprised when his first plan (stand still and listen for Angron's voice) failed. He'd heard quieter thunderstorms than the 'Angry One's' idea of polite conversation.

Checking the nearest pastures, where the younger warriors liked to gather to spar, ride horses dangerously and brag of how many heads they would take when they rode the stars with their uncles, great-uncles and (of course) the Great Khan, was also fruitless.

Finally he resorted to the ancient and secret tricks for finding a man in the camp: asking one of the women. They pointed him in the right direction and he eventually found a circle of children, many of them on mother's laps, watching as Angron and Esin danced with swords.

Perched easily on the fence by the audience, Amphitoe was almost unrecognisable in breeches and a brightly coloured jacket, only her flowing hair giving away her identity as she fiddled, her violin sending notes up high and rich to guide the pace of the two dancers.

Esin, Jaghatai knew of old was quicksilver flair with her sabre slashing through the air just as its mistress slashed through the dance. In sharp contrast, Angron _roared_ through the dance - not verbally, but the wind bellowing around him as - wearing a baggy shirt and a pair of Jaghatai's own riding breeches, he pounded through the steps. To the Khan's knowledge the two had never crossed swords before but each placed their weapons in paths that would have cut the other seriously (even Angron's resilience might not withstand that silver sabre) had not the other without fail had their sword where it was needed to block it.

For this was no duel, it was a dance - symbolic of combat but filled with whirls and flourishes that told the tale behind the battle being played out. As Jaghatai watched, he knew without words that this was battle-between-oathbrothers where the winner would carry his brother's fate with him to the heavens and the loser must bear his brother's burden with his own across the plains.

And then, with another glorious crescendo of notes from Amphitoe it concluded: Angron on his knees, head flung back until the crown of his head almost touched the ground, Esin standing with one foot braced upon the much larger Primarch, her blade thrust apparently through her foes heart while his spun above them, caught in the moment. Jaghatai, like all the audience, caught up in the performance, felt as if he could not take a breath.

Then Angron _flexed_ and they sprang into the air, like a pair of jack-in-the-boxes, landing on their feet with a flourish of now scabbarded swords (Angron catching his in its sheath while in mid-air was just showing off) and bows to their delighted audience.

"I didn't know you were such an entertainer," Jaghatai teased his brother later.

Angron glared at him. "YOU DON'T GET TO BE THE GREATEST GLADIATOR ON A PLANET WITHOUT KNOWING HOW TO PLEASE A CROWD," he pointed out and wouldn't talk to anyone for the rest of the day. (Esin kicked Jaghatai and he sort of suspected that Amphitoe wanted to.)

* * *

The World Eaters Legion (officially, Chapters deriving from the World Eaters Legion, but everyone in the Legion knew the truth (the first rule of being in the Legion is that you do not speak of the Legion (at least to Ultramarines))) did not celebrate Emperor's Day. This was largely because, for some inexplicable reason, everyone seemed to think that they would visit orphanages and Imperial Schola and perform acts of caring for small children.

World Eaters did not have anything against small children, but they were generally more inclined towards killing things than they were to cuddling. Their best service to children, in their view, was getting rid of any predators that might eat or otherwise prey upon them.

Therefore the World Eaters (legion) celebrated Recruiting Day, an annual festival that just so happened to coincide with Emperor's Day.

The experience of the Red Lancers Chapter, who were technically considered World Eaters even if careful study of their geneseed showed evidence of Angron having borrowed valuable equipment and genetic research from the Imperial Palace to create geneseed from his favorite nephew for the Chapter, was typical. Which was to say that they stormed through the lower levels of a Hive City, eradicating anything that looked remotely illegal and drafting any boys of suitable age who put up a credible resistance as Aspirants.

It's possible that the Aspirants may have had their first meal aboard World Eater warships surrounded by various festive trappings, with roast poultry served to them and crackers, but this is - as any World Eater will assure you with a straight face - nothing to do with reverence of the Emperor.

* * *

The great bells of the Imperial Palace tolled solemnly once, every hour.

Tomorrow they would toll every half hour, the day after every quarter hour... increasing in frequency until on the seventh day every bell of the palace would toll every sixteen seconds in tribute to the fallen.

Parades of black-robed Astartes marched across thousands of worlds, followed by great columns of mourners.

Crowds of hundreds of thousands gathered outside museums that were home to tokens that somehow were symbolic of the Imperium's loss. On Terra, it was the great Museum of Angron's Sons, where the Princess and her court gathered in mourning garb and the crowd outside was hundreds of millions, swarming around the army of great hound statues that stood silent guard over the Hive Tower.

The Ratel Legion, a chapter of the third founding, had fallen. The brothers lay looking down upon the fields of battle from atop the mounds of the dead they had felled across thirty worlds where detachments had been operating. Their outposts and towers had been levelled, with every cellar and sub-bunker torn open by furious orbital bombardment to the point that no less than three of those thirty worlds would be rendered uninhabitable for centuries. Their great chapter house, a citadel that had been dug beneath an ancient mountain on an airless moon, had been torn from the surface by ancient and awesome devices and flung into the sky where legion after legion of the slave-soldiers of the ancient Slann had stormed aboard, dying by the thousand to bring down the surviving Ratel Legionnaires one at a time.

It was an empty victory for that dying and decrepit race.

The great vaults of geneseed stored within the fortress had been purged with virus bombs, rendering the facilities inaccessible to all and the contents corrupted ruins. Trophies and banners had been destroyed rather than surrendered. Secret hoards of archeotech weaponry had been opened and unleashed upon the invaders at great cost. Even as the cunning and corrupt Great Mage of the Slann stood before his braves upon the dais where once the now pulverised throne of the Chapter Master had been placed, he knew that his fate was sealed. That in trying to avert the doom of prophecy he had called it down himself

There was no mourning in the echoing halls of chapter houses and flagships of the XII Legion. It was not their way to wail in grief.

Fifty thousand Astartes girded themselves for war. It would be the Slann who would wail and howl and scream in anguish. Angron himself, flanked by Ira and by Alta would wage war to the knife upon the race that had presumed to cut down the 14th Chapter of his Legion. Upon the ashes of alien homes the last legacy of the Ratel Legion would be the expiration of their killers. Only then, like a phoenix, would lots be drawn and the sons of many different chapters assembled to rebirth the Ratel and take on their legend.

And upon distant Terra, Serenity wept for the soul of her brother and for those of his brutal, beloved sons.


	5. Miscellaneous Snippets

_A/N: Various snippets, from various continuities. They may make more sense if you read snippets by other writers in the universe, listed under the author-name Lovehammer Inc._

* * *

There had been a deadly silence in the War Council's chamber, even the ever confident Fulgrim realising that perhaps he had asked a question that should not have been asked. It was a moment that deserved to be immortalised in art somehow: Rogal Dorn's face set in calculation as he considered the matter placed before him, Horus turning from the congratulations he had been heaping upon Perturabo for the latter's siegecraft at Badcon to offer a silent plea to his brother for atypical diplomacy in his answer.

Could the defenses of the Imperial Palace withstand an assault by the Iron Warriors?

Dorn's Imperial Fists were renowned for their mastery of the siege. Any fortification of their design would be formidable. But Perturabo's Legion were possessed of an equally high reputation and their Primarch had just been declared by the Warmaster to be the greatest master of siege warfare in the Crusade.

Now one thoughtless - or not so thoughtless - question could splinter this moment of triumph shared between four of the most distinguished of the Emperor's Primarchs.

Could the defenses of the Imperial Palace withstand an assault by the Iron Warriors?

If Rogal Dorn had ever been less than totally honest it was not known to Imperial history. "If well manned, I regard those defenses as proof against any assault."

There was no sense of challenge to his words. There never was. Some truths, in the eyes of the Praetorian, were unquestionable.

Serenity was the Emperor's heir.

Horus was the only possible choice as the Warmaster of the Imperium.

The Imperial Palace was as impregnable as his more than mortal hands could make it.

Perturabo's great fists clenched and then relaxed. "That might be sufficent to guard our sister," he said at last and tension ebbed from the room as Horus slapped his taciturn brother on the back and even Rogal Dorn unbent enough to offer a toast to the Iron Warriors guardianship of the Imperium's worlds.

* * *

The crowds looked at them in a mix of awe and fear. Not an unsurprising reaction to a squad of Astartes. After all, they were usually seen on the battlefield, not in the main concourse of Yarbarra Hives largest shopping mall. Despite it being the first day of the Winterfestival Sales, which meant that every one of the mall's thirty floors and forty thousand stores was packed solid, the Astartes were given a respectful berth of at least a full metre at all times.

It was inevitable, however, that someone would start asking questions. In this case it was a small boy, clutching a toy Leman Russ to his chest.

"Are you really Astartes?"

"Yes."

"Are you Space Wolves?"

There was a palpable grimace from the Space Marine who had to peer down over his breastplate to even see the boy. "No. We are not from the Sixth Legion."

The boy thought about this. "Iron Hands?"

"...no. We are Iron Warriors, the legion of Perturabo!"

There was a look of perplexed disappointment on the boy's face. "Is that really a Legion?"

Through gritted teeth: "Yes."

"Because I've never heard of him." The boy held up his toy. "This is the Wolf King." He pulled on a string and, just barely audible over the sounds of frenzied shoppers, a tinny voice demanded that he be provided with mead and raw meat for his wolves.

"He's actually taller than that. And louder."

"Really?" This pleased the child. "Are you here to fight someone?"

"We devoutly hope that it does not come to that."

"Oh. Are there enemies of the Emperor here?"

Hidden behind his helmet, the Iron Warrior's face twitched and he wished he had been allowed to bring his boltgun. "There is an ancient and terrible evil here that we must confront," he warned prudently. "One that has brutalised mankind for thousands of years. We can only hope that some of us survive the experience."

"Wow! I have to tell my mom!" The boy concluded and scampered off. The crowd started to ripple and shift as the information, changed and mutated by the inevitable effects of being passed from one to another in a loud environment took effect.

Five minutes later the floor was all but deserted, with the crowds entirely centered upon the doors as citizens of the Imperium did their level best to avoid the horrors that the Astartes were here to deal with.

There was a sizzling crackle in the air and five slim figures appeared around the teleport homer that the Iron Warriors had been guarding. A pair of gold-armoured Custodes stood behind their leader.

"Hmm, I thought the mall would be busier today," Princess Usagi said in surprise as she looked around. "Oh well. All the more bargains for us!"

The Custodes looked around and one of them faced towards the Iron Warriors sergeant. "Pair off," he ordered. "Two of you with each of them at all times. Just keep quiet, hold the bags and if it gets to much... there's no parking for the Stormbird within a mile so we don't have any back-up."

The sergeant nodded. "I only hope they don't see..."

"Squee! Twenty percent off all swimwear!" One of the girls announced. "Come on girls."

A low whine emerged from the Iron Warrior's vox and the Custodes nodded sadly. "We're doomed," he agreed sadly. "Come on lads. For the Emperor's daughter..."

{Addition by Bloody Mary}

"Why not Fulgrim?" Perturabo grumbled, glaring acidly at Rogal Dorn.

Dorn, on his part, remained stoic and took a sip of wine before replying. "You do remember what happened last time? The fact that he likes malls does not mean he should be allowed to accompany our sister and her honour guard. Besides, Mercury is your wife. Shouldn't you be happy to help her?"

Perturabo snorted. "By that logic, you're as good a candidate as me. Venus is your cousin, isn't she?"

"And she threatened to record the pillow fort stories if I ever accompanied her on a shopping trip," Dorn replied, not managing to keep some smugness from creeping into his voice.

"What about Russ, then?" Perturabo asked, frowning.

"Lo! Did the hero rise his mighty mop and clean the treacherous floor!" a thunderous roar sounded from the depths of the Imperial Palace.

Dorn shrugged. "As far as I know he promised to do the cleaning himself in return for not having to accompany the Princess."

"Only a spoonful of detergent did he add to the water, no more, no less!"

"Is he enjoying it or is he yelling to make us all suffer with him?" Pertuabo asked, looking towards the door.

* * *

The Dux Primus of the Eragrate Stars had offered to accept the fealty of the Emperor if he bowed his knee and sent a daughter to join the Dux' hareem.

It took Perturabo's Iron Warriors seventeen hours to seize control of the Eragrate Warfleet, tear open the orbital defenses, suppress the fortresses around the palatial Forbidden City in which the Dux Primus resided and land troops. That was less time than it had taken to convince Night Haunter, Angron and Horus that Perturabo would deal with the matter. (Four days and sixteen hours, for those curious.)

Raising one massive hand towards great double doors of the palace's grand hall, Perturabo held himself completely still as the conversion beamer built into his gauntlet went to work. One second, two seconds... The doors disintegrated in a spectacular fashion and a cold smirk crossed his lips. Tekhne had been very thoughtful to provide him with this little upgrade for his birthday. He'd have to think of something special for hers.

Waving aside his Iron Warriors, the Primarch strode menacingly through the debris.

The Dux Primus' bodyguards were good, dedicated soldiers. Perturabo methodically blew them apart with single shots from his bolt pistol. Clean deaths. A mercy, under the circumstances. The last of their bodies was on the floor before he was halfway along the hall and women scattered in front of the grim war-god as he marched to the foot of the dais. Some of them were presumably members of the harem, others servants or daughters of the nobility. Assuming there was a difference.

Without pause, Perturabo ascended the dais and lifted the throne, Dux Primus and all, over his head. The screaming potentate clung to his seat until the Primarch shook it vigourously, spilling the former master of a dozen worlds onto the marble stairs. Then he returned the throne to its former place and sat upon it.

Gold limned and cushioned in crimson velvet, the throne was built on a scale to dwarf the corpulent Dux Primus. It creaked alarmingly under Perturabo's armoured form, which almost obscured the throne.

"Wh-who are you!" the Dux screamed, practically in tears. "Are you that upstart Emperor?"

There was no reply.

The Dux sweated. "I was merely joking about your daughter. I meant to offer one of my princely sons as her husband in token of our alliance."

The silence grew deadly. Perturabo's eyebrow twitched and then he raised his gauntlet aiming it directly at the grovelling Dux who screamed and threw himself flat in submission. The more prudent women cleared themselves away as the gauntlet began to hum.

"You are talking about my sister."

The Dux - who could have easily dodged the slow-firing conversion beam if he'd thought to - exploded, completely ruining the rug he had been sprawled upon.

Perturabo looked around the room and then pointed with his other hand at a woman who showed the telltale signs of having been treated with anti-agathics. "You, come here."

Possessed of at least some survival instincts the woman walked to stand before the throne and then knelt in the gorey splatter that had once been her husband. "How may I serve the Son of the Emperor?"

"My wife's birthday is in three weeks," he declared flatly. "What might she appreciate, do you think?"

* * *

Roboute saw the Emperor's gaze flicker to the Arcanium as they passed it. The gesture was almost imperceptible, the meaning almost inpenetrable.

Almost.

The capital of Ultramar was not one of the ancient cities of Macragge. Rather than favour the city that had tried to overthrow his fa... Konor, Roboute had reluctantly allowed the administration to settle around a small estate that he had been granted as a child. Now acres of perfectly proportioned towers and domes surrounded the old manor, much of which had been demolished to make way for his new and palatial residence.

Probably there would be another spate of rebuilding to accomodate the leadership of Roboute's new Legion, although he hoped to place their functional headquarters somewhere more secluded. The architects would probably suggest again that the ancient stone building with its handcrafted iron fittings be replaced with something more fitting to the architectural style of the city that had grown up around it.

Obviously his new Emperor agreed with them. Not unreasonable, Roboute had to admit. Keeping his boyhood retreat intact was one of the few acts of sentiment that he allowed himself.

Sentiment did not seem to be the Emperor's forte.

He was not the only one to follow his new father's gaze. Clearly his sister - and that was a considerable surprise - was also well versed in the Emperor's body language for she looked directly over at the Arcanium and then smiled warmly. "Oh that's perfect!"

Roboute and the Emperor looked at her with identical questioning expressions.

"It's a beautiful city, Roboute," she assured him. "But that's the first part I've seen that fits your personality." Then Serenity blushed slightly. "It is yours, isn't it?"

"Yes." Roboute hesitated fractionally. "My father gave it to me."

The Emperor gave him a measuring look and then nodded. "Serenity's better at this than I am," he admitted blandly, "But it's clear Konor was a fine man and a good father."

The Consul of Macragge was still processing this tenative gesture of acceptance of his mixed feelings when Serenity seized his arm. "Can we see more of your home, Roboute?"

* * *

Space around Alaitoc burned as Imperial warships hurtled towards the craftworld. In comparison to the elegant eldar frigates with their wraithbone hulls and solar sails, the grand cruisers and battleships were ugly and crude, but there were a lot of them.

Inside the layered defenses of the fleet, dozens of transports carried regiment after regiment of the Imperial Army, but the spearhead of the transport fleet was a battlebarge and four strike cruisers, all in the white and blue of one of the most infamous of Astartes legions.

The seers of Alaitoc had been alerted many cycles previously of this attack. Not, unfortunately, early enough to prevent the campaign of piracy by a band of outcast Alaitoci rangers from provoking the attack. And not in time to avert the wrath of the Imperium by assassinating a few key members of the local chain of command and leaving the mon-keigh in disarray until the whole matter had blown over.

(If quizzed, most of the Eldar on Alaitoc would have catagorised the Imperial attack as a gross over-reaction. Certainly thousands of mon-keigh had died and billions more suffered as a result of the economic damage, but what of the dozens of Eldar who had died carrying out the attacks? Who would answer for their deaths and the furthering of the Eldar race's slow slide towards extinction?)

Beset by visions of soldiers over-running the halls and domes of Alaitoc, of mon-keigh tanks crushing the gates to the Dome of Crystal Seers beneath their tracks, of hundreds Eldar children being marched off by grim Astartes for re-education on those Exodite worlds that had chose to subordinate themselves to the short-sighted Emperor and his lunatic Daughter, the seers had devoted many cycles to measuring the tactics and strategies to be employed against them and on their advice counter-plans had been laid by the autarchs.

Every possible reserve would be called in. Small bands - all that could be spared - of warriors from the aspect shrines of other Craftworlds had arrived through the webway, as had warbands from the similar Exodite worlds as favours eons old were called in. Pledges and bargains had been made, calling in aid and farseers had not hesitated to subtly influence even outcasts and the accursed fiends of Commarrgh to assist them in their time of need. Without them, Alaitoc was doomed.

And as the warfleet closed towards Alaitoc one of those groups was being positioned neatly to take advantage of the mon-keigh predictability. Reaching out through the skein, one junior seer reached out to the leader of the pirates who'd caused this mess in the first place. It had taken the firm persuasion of a Harlequin to convince the renegade to make the dangerous attack but no one more expendable was going to take the job. "Now."

In an instant the webway portal opened and a dozen raiding vessel plunged out, deep inside the Imperial formations, the frigates already firing lasers and distortion cannon into the vulnerable transports. The pass had been carefully calculated: the pirates had only a few precious moments to wreak havoc before returning to the webway, the honour debt paid.

Unfortunately those moments had been planned on the basis of unarmed transports. Not on vessels that were busily ejecting panels over weapon systems and spitting out boarding torpedoes in a black and white livery similar too - but lethally different from - that of the World Eaters.

The seer screamed a warning - Comes The Raven! - but it was far, far too late. At point blank range all but one pirate vessel found itself with boarders breaking through the wraithbone to enter their interiors. The one exception found itself targeted by a tremendous barrage from the armed merchant vessels and disintegrated long before it could reach an escape vector.

Aboard the other vessels, Eldar pirates rallied in the defense of the ships that were also their homes, but they were facing experts in the same hit and run operations that they themselves favoured - experts with all the advantages of Astartes.

There could only be one outcome and ship after ship fell out of controlled flight with no Eldar left aboard free to handle them, and quite unable to be piloted by 'mere Mon-keigh'. That didn't bother the Raven Guard: they didn't want the ships. Just the crews. With the imperial ships moving into a defensive formation, the Astartes reboarded their torpedoes and began to return to their motherships. Each abandoned vessel was pounded to ruins before the Imperial fleet reversed course away from Alaitoc.

"What... what is happening?" one Farseer mumbled, predictions all askew.

"We have what we came for." The seers turned and saw a tall, robed figure emerge from the shadows of their chamber. Her hood fell back, revealing long jade green hair.

The alien word came to a dozen lips: Senshi.

She bowed her head, key-like sceptre in one hand. "Alta, of Caliban," she acknowledged. "Your predictions were correct. Without the pirate, Alaitoc was doomed. By playing bait for them, you have served our needs."

"You used us?"

"Indeed. Take this message." Her face was stern. "Clean your messes before they draw our attention and we will endeavour to do likewise. Fail to do so and an attack like this will not stop with the immediately guilty, but also the system that enables them."

In moments the woman vanished in the distinctive flash of a mon-keigh teleporter, leaving the Council of Seers to digest that they - the arch-manipulators - had expended favours and resources at the manipulation of another, younger race.

* * *

The soldiers were glad that the local guide was wrong - the river was still low enough over the ford that they could rush a force across. Two hundred men and thirty fighting vehicles in the rear of the invaders who called themselves the Emperor's Children would shatter their logistical base and delay the assault on their city for several days.

They weren't alarmed when they saw a lone woman watching them cross the ford, the inches deep water fanning out in great wakes down stream as they rushed through it. A sentry was only to be expected, and who cared what she reported when they were almost across and...

Hundreds of tons of water, packed up half-a-mile distant as if by a dam, slammed into the flank of the little column like an avalanche. Four of the fighting vehicles were simply crushed by the impact, the others spinning away in the current, tumbling like shards of wood rather than multi-ton military vehicles. Those which had had open hatches flooded almost immediately.

One survivor would claw his way out of the river, almost forty miles away. Fortunately for him, it was on the Imperial side and so he was simply taken into custody rather than given a spare rifle and pushed out in front of the approaching Emperor's Children to force them to expend one more bolter-shell or swipe of a sword on the way to the city walls.

But that was more than an hour in the future. For now, Sailor Neptune simply raised her mirror and told Fulgrim that the ford was secured.

* * *

The years of the Great Crusade were a golden age for the Priests of Mars. While the construction of the fleets that would carry out the Crusade, and the continuing demand for equipment to supply the losses suffered by the hundreds of expeditionary fleets, Mars profited immensely by re-establishing contact with it's scattered daughter-forges across the Galaxy.

Year after year ships loaded with data cores arrived detailing the discoveries of myriad brilliant researchers, some of them eons dead but their reports still fresh and new to the eager priesthood. Along with these came samples of ancient and alien technologies found across the galaxy. While there was some rumbling that the Omnissiah - who the profane called the Emperor - had elected to seal away certain ancient vaults, these were buried by the reported battle honours of their militant Legions and the excitement of the gathered lore.

Under the hands of eager tech-priests projects that promised a return to the glory days of the Dark Ages of Technology flourished and they received guidance and aid from their patrons in the Imperial Family: Ferrus Manus, Vulkan, Tekne and to a lesser extent Fulgrim and Tekne. Many of the most fervent ForgeWorlds were those brought into the Imperium's sister-realm of Mars by these four.

Following the Victory of Ullanor, the Omnissiah returned from his wars and took up residence upon Terra, burying himself in a secretive project of his own. While he brought many peerless scholars and savants of the Priesthood to his side in this labour, he elected not to divulge details to Fabricator-General Kelbor-Hal, who was understandably concerned that what must obviously be a matter of the highest significance and demanded an unparalleled degree of technological expertise should be taking place on mere Terra and not the natural location for such a work: Mars.

This disgruntlement laid the foundations of Kelbor-Hal's corruption. Consumed with doubts as to whether he had been correct, centuries earlier, to identify the Emperor as the Omnissiah (despite what had been overwhelming evidence at the time) he was easily convinced that the truth lay within the Forbidden Vaults. Some time prior to the outbreak of the Heresy, a certain traitor within the Royal Family provided him with the codes to access the Vaults and when he returned from them, Kelbor-Hal retained no doubts at all.

The Fabricator-General's actions during the Heresy are a matter of legend. At first a covert ally, diverting supplies to the traitors and away from loyalists, he soon could not keep his revelatory experience to himself, introducing scrapcode into the Martian datasphere and spreading his personal heresy by trusted envoy to dozens of ForgeWorlds. It was not long before loyalist Tech-Priests discovered his true allegiance but they also learned that ousting the man-machine who controlled all the mechanisms of war would not be easy. While the Heresy raged through the Imperium of Terra, it's sister-realm of Mars was crippled by civil strife on almost every ForgeWorld, effectively crippling it.

Kelbor-Hal was eventually driven from Mars and his Dark Mechanicum still persists in the dark corners of the galaxy. However what remained of the Empire of Mars was a shattered ruin, not only in material - few Imperial worlds were savaged by forces to compare with those that the TechPriests had dared to unleash upon each other - but also in confidence and in wisdom. Very few of the great minds of that generation survived and even with the heretics departed, those who remained lacked a guiding vision to direct them in rebuilding. Instead, fractures formed and it seemed that what remained of their Empire would fall into darkness.

At this point, the Royal Family stepped in. Ferrus Manus had rallied a considerable number of the remaining Titan Legions and their associated Knightly Orders under his banner during the Heresy. He now led them in a superlatively calculated campaign to reconquer the erring ForgeWorlds and once again subordinate them to Mars. While grateful, the remaining High Magos were appalled at the price demanded for this aid: no longer would Terra and Mars maintain two parallel but intertwined Imperiums. Instead the Gorgon demanded that they be united and that the Priests of Mars would be come just one of several great institutions of the Imperium of Mankind.

It was Tekne who emerged as the champion of the Mechanicum in those days (just as Ira would play a vital moderating role in negotiating the sanctioning of psyker talents in the post-Heresy Imperium), convincing the majority of the Imperial Family and of what would become the High Lords of Terra to grant substantial concessions in independence of actions and privileges of authority within their bailiwick to the Tech Priests. It is a legacy of her efforts, for example, that the Ordinatus warmachines and the Titan Legions remain servants to the Martian Priesthood and not incorporated into the Munitorium's command structure.

In gratitude for her advocacy, the High Magos bestowed upon Tekne the honours of Fabricator-General (although she would hold far less authority over them than had previously been entrusted to Kelbor-Hal) and she went on to represent them among the High Lords for some centuries as the renamed Adeptus Mechanicus underwent a period of rebuilding. During this period, focused upon restoration and reconstruction, a deep vein of orthodoxy sank into the Mechanicum. What had once been done could be recreated but innovation became seen as reckless and associated with the heresies of Kelbor-Hal, whose Dark Mechanicus was hardly forgotten, with dozens of wars and many more insurrections and counter-insurrections marking struggle against his agents.

Tekne had stepped aside as Fabricator-General to pursue her own family affairs and private research, once the Mechanicum was stabilised, but she remained a Magos in good standing. However, by the 33rd Millenium the same stresses that had brought the Eccleisiarchy into formalised being was straining at the Adeptus Mechanicum. Disgruntled rumours suggested that the dispute between Tekne and Ferrus Manus over the fate of the Mechanicum had been staged, even scripted, to force them into compliance with Terra. Tekne's innovative research and studies were dragged into the public light and castigated by the Martian leadership (who feared that the Priests would be made subservient to the Eccleisiarchy), barely avoiding being declared Heretek. However, a considerable number of Tech-Priests and even some entire Forge-Worlds sided with Tekne, out of loyalty to a former and still much-respected Fabricator-General although not always for her policies. A Second Schism reared it's ugly head, this time between Mars and what were described as the Mercurian faction.

This potential rift had blindsided most of the Imperial Family and an immediate reaction was required. Once Angron and Perturabo were persuaded that storming Mars and hanging the Fabricator-General from the top of a hive spire by various intimate bodily mechanisms was not the best course of action, a number of senior Magos were invited to Terra and discussed the matter with Ira, Vulkan and Roboute Guilleman, with Constantin Valdor representing the Emperor symbolically as arbitrator.

Rather than a war, the Second Schism manifested in a series of 'palace' coups with relatively little opne strife except on two ForgeWorlds where the local Titan Legions (one Martian, one Mercurian) took violent exception to the ouster of radical ForgeMasters. The (Martian-loyalist) Ordo Machina Martius, stood down and accepted a compromise replacement ForgeMaster rather than fight a sizeable detachment of the Legio Cybernetica and the Brazen Claw space marine chapter. Their Mercurian counter-parts, Ordo Purus Pilum, regrettably fled their home ForgeWorld faced with a similar response and investigation determined that their practises transgressed against several rulings against heretek. Their Titan's have since been seen in service to several Chaos warlords.

Some fifty years after being publically decried, Tekne knelt in submission on Mars before a Conclave of Magos representing every known ForgeWorld (her husband and almost the entire Chapter of the Iron Warriors were in orbit over Terra in pointed reminder), before being welcomed amongst them as an equal. The Third Treaty of Mars specifically granted Tekne and fourteen 'radical' ForgeWorlds broader but still limited license to innovate but restricted them from control of any Legions of Titans or Robots. In return, Tekne agreed that her research would be subject to scrutiny from Mars before being circulated to other ForgeWorlds (except daughter-Forges of her Mercurian ForgeWorlds) and to take responsibility for the maintenance and repair of the Ordo Ordinatus - their archeotech status making them a natural fit for her radical followers. Furthermore, representing the Imperial Family she confirmed that the religious beliefs of the Adeptus Mechanicus would be seperate but equal to those of the Adeptus Ministorium.

Symbolically, since that day, Tekne's followers have worn blue robes rather than the red robes of the mainstream Adeptus Mechanicus. While some of her ForgeWorlds have fallen to invasion - being favoured enemies of the Dark Mechanicus - and at least one has been destroyed due to an experimental accident, others survive and have even founded new ForgeWorlds elsewhere. Relations between blue-skirt and red-robe have waxed and waned over the years but the basic treaty has been upheld, with many High Magos seeing the Mercurians as a useful release valve, happily exporting their disruptive radicals to 'waste Tekne's resources'.

* * *

"You are insane," Roboute Guilleman said seriously.

It was a remarkable understatement of the Primarch of XIII Legion to make. But it was a remarkable moment.

"I am going to kill you," he added. The tone of his voice was perfectly conversational. The way that his gauntleted hands were moving was the only clue that he wasn't entirely calm. No one on the bridge had ever seen him show even that much agitation however, and more than one officer found that the movement focused their attention far more than the ill-defined readings coming from their still overloaded auspex systems.

The man displayed in the bridge hololith was no less unfamiliar with this as a mannerism of his brother. But where the officers of Roboute Guilleman's staff found it unnerving, he found it _delightful_.

"You sound distraught, dear Roboute," he declared in mocking tones of amazement. "Calm yourself, lest your father think less of his perfect son."

"He is also your father." Outside, the consequences of the death-ride of the cruise Campanile continued to spread through the orbtials with cataclysmic force and mind-numbing speed. Hundreds of ships had been wrecked by debris or by the eager guns of Lorgar's Word Bearers. Soldiers by the million had been blotted away before they even knew that they were under attack. Many of the superhuman Astartes who called Roboute Guilleman father had fared no better.

Beneath them all, Calth _burned_.

Lorgar Aurelian laughed like the madman that Guilleman named him.

"I have more worthy fathers now, Guilleman. More worthy than the one who you helped leave orphaned on the desecrated soil of Monarchia."

The consequences of the sudden dive of the Campanile into Calth's orbitals would take the supernatural genius of a Primarch to understand and perhaps only the genius of Guilleman and his renowned ability to make sense of thousands of apparently unrelated details could conceivably re-impose order and sanity upon a universe that had suddenly been upended.

"You bastard," Guilleman breathed. "You've been holding that as a grudge? This is some twisted revenge?"

He was, however, rather distracted.

His brother shook his head pityingly. "Oh no, Roboute. Not a grudge. I forgive you that trespass readily and without hesitation." His smile was that of a serpent. "You placed me on the true path, so please consider this to be my heartfelt thanks to you."

"You cannot possibly imagine that anyone will shield you from the consequences." Guilleman's voice did not shake in the slightest. Only the keenest of observers could have seen the fractional dilation of his pupils. "Traitoris Excommunicatus. Russ and his Wolves will hunt your sons to the end of the universe if they have to."

"Oh Roboute, are you losing your cool? Please don't diminish yourself in the such a manner." Lorgar's lips parted slightly to reveal his gleaming canines. "This tactic, this _treachery_ as I have named it, is tearing the heart from your Legion. Please don't attempt to diminish my glory by suggesting that you are opposing it with anything but your best attention." Then he waved one gauntleted hand dismissively. "As for Russ... please don't concern yourself with him. Our trap has already closed around him, remember to ask him about it in whatever hell you might find yourselves sharing."

Guilleman's voice cracked with a stark warning: "No one legion, not even the largest, can stand alone against the Imperium."

"Has even your hearing deserted you." Lorgar's image stepped forwards, impossibly exiting the hololith to stalk the deck towards his brother. "I said _our_ trap, Roboute. _I do not stand alone_."

There was nothing wrong with the reflexes of those around the bridge and despite their astonishment that Lorgar somehow walked amongst them, a dozen bolt pistols were aimed for him instantly. Only a concern for ricochet damage to the many delicate systems around them caused Roboute Guilleman to gesture for calm. That and of course that the mass-reactive shells would hardly be sufficient to harm his fallen brother even if he were truely present and not a mere phantasm.

"How arrogant you are, out here in your lonely kingdom," Lorgar mused. "The wise, noble Roboute Guilleman... the universe has _changed_ and all will be made anew... yet you know nothing. The heavens are _ablaze_ but Ultramar stands pristine and _ignorant_ of the truth."

"Who?" That simple question fell into the silence that had followed Lorgar's words. The words of Guilleman of course. Even the stout heart of an Ultramarine might quail before the silver tongue of the Primarch of the XVII Legion, but their Primarch was made, quite literally, of sterner stuff.

Lorgar chuckled. "Magnus, of course, to lure the Wolf from his den. The Lion, to enter that den. I am sure that Russ will enjoy the warm welcome offered by his cold, cold world when he seeks to lick his wounds."

Instant dismissal: "That is nonsense."

"Is it? You think you know the hearts of men, Roboute? Consider the Lion, examine his pride and his ambition. Think of Dulan and how the two fought then. Imagine also that when that abusive parent you still revere has been ground into the dust, there will be room for a new Warmaster and el'Jonson has been promised it. The Gates of Fenris lie open for him..."

Guileman laughed himself, with certainty. "While the Storm Caller holds them? Thora is a fine host but far too shrewd for such a ploy."

"Thora is one of us." Lorgar's eyes gleamed. "She has always known that she was in communion with something greater than herself and her tale of how Russ wooed her speaks more of his brutality than his charm. She will gladly rid herself of him."

"Impossible." The words were confident. Convincing. False. For the seed of doubt had touched Guilleman's mind. The Emperor had placed strict limits upon exploration of psychic abilites, and there was no doubt that Thora was as potently gifted in her own way as even Magnus himself.

"So claimed Ferrus Manus," revealed Lorgar. "At first, at least. His tongue was stilled admirably by Fulgrim's sword and his skull is now a trophy. Alas, less evidence remains of Vulkan and Corax. The tools of exterminating worlds can be quite... indiscriminant."

He smiled slightly. "You are imagining yourself rushing back to Terra, at the head of an avenging army, are you not, Roboute? You may as well abandon such fantasies: I would not speak of such matters if you could avert them. We are, after all, so very far away and my allies are already crowding the star roads on their way to Terra."

"Dorn holds Terra. He will be an unbreakable anvil for your ambitions," promised Guilleman. The faintest touch of sweat was upon his brow. "Horus will be the hammer that crushes you against him."

"Oh?" The was a terrible mischief in Lorgar's eyes. "Imagine the great glories of Terra, my naive brother. Imagine the Iron Warriors laying siege to the Imperial Palace, for more than half of them have scorned their foolish Primarch and his whore to march under our banner. Imagine Angron's Legion alongside them, summoned for the greatest battle of history." He shrugged. "Take heart if you will, that Mortarion remains loyal if somewhat bereaved of his pet. How sad. Peresphone had such potential, she could have taken Serenity's place and ruled as our Dark Queen but she lacked the vision to -"

Words were ended in the staccato boom of mass-reactive bolt shells tearing through the seeming of Lorgar as Guilleman raised his fists and the stormbolters built into each mighty gauntlet expressed their own counter-argument.

Explosions tore through the crew stations behind the apparition, and then into the calculating engines behind them. None plucked at the armour of the Ultramarines at those posts although each quickly threw themselves away from their posts to clear room for their primarch to work. Lorgar threw back his head and laughed, but there seemed to have been something material to his presence for not every shell passed through unhindered. A piece at a time, the surface was peeled away, revealing behind it something very different from Lorgar Aurelian, Primarch of the Word Bearers.

Then he lowered what ought to be his face, marked still by some miracle, with his eyes and met Guilleman's angry glare. "Once you have made me what I ought to be."

The explosion that gutted the bridge of the Fist of Macragge was lost entirely in the apocalyptic devestation that surrounded the battlebarge. Dozens of the senior staff of the Legion were killed and fires raged through the violated compartments of the command tower.

Flung out into the void, having been stood between Lorgar's... presence... and a sizeable viewport, Guilleman ignored completely the lack of atmosphere, instead twisting himself and firing one further shot to stablise his tumble. If the vaccum of space had not taken his breath away, no doubt the carnage - spread across literally billions of cubic miles but plainly visible to his eyes - would have done so.

A hand touched the elbow of his armour gently and that slight touch drew his attention away from the devestation around him.

Alta stood beside him, the chill of space and the merciless lack of air apparently of no more concern to her than it was to him. Her expression was no warmer than the frozen hell that they were in and for an instant Guilleman wondered if Lorgar's litany of traitors would have included her name had it not been cut off.

Then the shadows over her encarmine eyes were driven away briefly by the light cast by the death of the troop carrier Victory of Ullanor. The pain that Guilleman saw in those eyes made it clear that not every word borne by Lorgar could be false, yet that she at least knew the same agony that tore at his heart now.

There were no words, nor air to convey them had they been voiced. Yet there was one thing that he _could_ offer her.

For a moment, adrift in the burning skies above Calth, two loyal warriors shared a comradely embrace.

* * *

The spirits of the warp boiled and bubbled as they gathered. Death comes to all men, but this one was special. This one was older than most. Stronger than most. This one possessed values like duty and self-sacrifice, believing in them to the utmost. He had lived for them and he was dying of them and the creatures of the Warp did not know these things save as a taste that they wished to savour once he finished the tedious business of departing his body.

Brother-Sergeant Mikael of the Angels of Absolution, Silver Knight of the Company of Irae, died with his blade buried deep inside a Necron warmachine, his bolter spent of shells and his one remaining hand crushing the barrel of the soul-less creation's weapon. Behind him the door was closed. Behind him, his mistress and his brothers escaped this trap. They would fight on.

As his life guttered away, the soul of Mikael perceived briefly and in a limited way the warp that engulfed him and the hellish chaos that would briefly await him. Even his warrior spirit may have quailed at that. Here he had no sword. No armour. No brother to stand beside him.

But he was not alone.

For there was a silver light around him and he saw a slim, blonde woman awaiting him, her hair in two tails and a crystalline sword in her hand.

"You shall not have him," she swore to the warplings. "You shall not have Mikael, who is beloved to me. You don't get to take my knights, daemons. Not now, not ever."

And before that light, the Warp stilled as Serenity took Mikael forever home.

* * *

The statue of the Sigilite was unveiled with great ceremony and splendour. For hours the great and the good of the Imperium honoured the memory of their Emperor's closest advisor and friend. A great deal of business was also transacted but such was always the way. The wheels of government did not halt for anyone.

And as some said, Malcador would not have wished that they should.

In the twilight, when the guests had for the most part left the gardens for the warmer halls and grand corridors of the Imperial Palace to continue the wake, four figures still stood around the statue, each occupying a cardinal point. None looked at the memorial to Malcador, instead looking outwards.

Sanguinius, tall and noble with wings folded solemnly. Persephone, her long glaive resting upon one shoulder. Rogal Dorn, his sword held in both hands before him. Mortarion, hood drawn down over his eyes.

When the sun was fully beneath the horizon the four surrendered their places to others.

Angron slouched and unshaven, silent for once. Thora, clad in furs from a dozen worlds, holding a long sword in one hand. Her husband Leman Russ, for once in armour unmarked by runes and trophies. Features masked by concealing robes, Luther of Caliban.

Stars glittered above them when the vigil was relieved by the next group.

Roboute Guilleman, robed as a scholar and armed only with a stave. Tekne, her rarely used bolt pistol at her belt. Perturabo, wearing Terminator Armour, to loom menacingly over all who would approach. Artai Khan, all but anonymous beneath his helm.

With the first moonlight to touch the statue, came others.

Serenity stood watch in her almost never seen silver armour. To her right, Horus, a black tabard over his own warplate. Magnus, lone eye unblinking despite unashamed tears. And Ira, bow half-drawn with fiery arrow at the ready.

Under the full moon they departed and were replaced by others.

Corax stood still as a statue, black hair stirred by the night wind. Lion El'Jonson, hands on the hilt of the famed Lion Sword. Alta, seemingly wrapped in shadows save for the glow of her garnet rod. In unmarked black armour, Omegon bore no weapon but a single banner defiantly displaying the hydra.

Clouds covering the moon, it was hard to guess at how long they stood before the next watch arrived.

Fulgrim, hair unkempt, magnificent as ever in his grief. Senshi Baal Primus, medical bag on one shoulder, Imperial Guard lasgun at parade rest. Night Haunter, in the ceremonial garb and crown he had worn as king of Nostramo. Azmina Dorn, a metal goblet in one hand that she poured out upon the flowerbed around the statue before leaving.

The first glimmer of the sun could be made out when they were relieved and the last watch took their places.

Ferrus Manus, fully clad for war, hammer in hand. Senshi Macragge, hair in twin tails, a heavy mace resting with its head on the ground. Vulkan dressed plainly beneath a blacksmith's apron. The Emperor, leaning somewhat upon Malcador's own staff.

And when the crowds were gone, and the gardens were silent, perhaps a khan stood there in spirit, if not body. Flanking him a saber-wielding rider. At his back, a songstress - her trident across her back. And knelt beside them, a golden prodigal son touched by grief, if not by guilt.

* * *

Every Iron Warrior is a hero.

The Warsmith commanding a garrison of ten on a loyal Imperial World? He knows that the enemies of Mankind may arrive at any time, making his citadel a key bastion in the defense of the planet. He does not stint in his labours.

The Apothecary touring hospices and clinics in the mines of an asteroid belt? He isn't just looking for children with the potential for recruitment into the Legion. He's also ensuring that the physicans and the sisters Hospitallier have the tools and dedication to minister to those of the Imperium's citizens who need them most. His service never ends.

The Librarian that looms at the back of the Governor's entourage is both bodyguard and watchdog over the leaders of key strategic worlds in a hundred sectors and a thousand sub-sectors. If a world falls to treason then he will die alone as a failure but through him the Imperium will know and his brothers will come to the rescue of the victims of revolution.

The Scouts who tramp the earth of a world just brought into compliance aren't just the iron fist of the Administratium. They are mapping sites for hidden supply bases that will support far flung operations by Astartes companies thousands of light-years from their Chapter and ensuring due compensation for those whose resources the Imperium will require. You're welcome.

Every one of them can drop everything but a boltgun or chainsword and fight to preserve the lives of men and women. And on the days when they do not do this, they labour to make sure that those lives are better lives.

* * *

The cortege moved through the crowds with infinite dignity. On either side of the long road - stretching from the spaceport down in the foothills of the mountains, winding its way upward through the estates of the mighty and the towering hives of the meagre, past hab-blocs of functionaries and shanty towns of craftsmen, to the very gates of the Imperial Palace itself - the crowds watched and wept.

Every footstep of the pallbearers was to the accompanying sound of a million weeping eyes.

More witnesses arrived every day. the skies were thick with traffic: flitters, jitneys, starships arriving from every corner of the galaxy all to unload those for whom this event was irresistable. Wealthy nobles rubbed shoulders with savage tribesmen come from the dead wastelands of Terra that had once been the oceans.

This was an event unprecendented, a moment not to be repeated in a lifetime, a century, a hundred eons.

To either side of the road grim guardians ensured that the crowds did not encroach. They were armed, as if a thin line of men and supermen could resist the unfathomable tide of humanity that flanked them. Grease-stained spacers from the fleets of warships above, soldiers of the Astartes, peacock-like officers from a hundred regiments, humble riflemen from a thousand battalions, cyborg skitarii, towering Astartes. There was no apparent order to their array. They simply came and stood until they saw the cortege arrive. Saw the ripples of movement among the crowd, part a desire to push forward and see more closely what passed and part a reluctance to intrude upon the dignity of this most public of private moments.

Ancient emperors had spent their entire lives preparing for these moments in their lives, crafted some of the greatest structures that humanity had ever known, surrounded themselves with treasures in what was to be their eternity.

The Emperor of Mankind had never expected to die.

No coffin had been waiting in a quiet corner, in preparation for this day. No tomb laid out with eagle-eyed precision to house him forever.

Such obstacles were nothing to his sons. Within a day of Rogal carrying their father's broken body into the halls of the Phalanx, within hours of Magnus slumping, hollow of voice in admission that their father's spirit was gone beyond his reach, Vulkan had wrought a casket of adamantium, each panel of its shape engraved with scenes that spoke without words to the soul of any who laid eyes upon it of the greatness of he who lay within. And then where the great smith's hammer had struck, over every inch, Fulgrim and Sanguinius had joined forces to add beauty to the stark admantium: for it was not enough that the Emperor be known to have been great. It was essential also that it be recorded that he had been and always would be loved.

Six stood tall, bearing that burden along that great road, the last march of the God-Emperor.

One walked before them, none behind.

Each warrior they passed dropped to his knees in final homage. Hundreds of miles, millions of men and scarcefully fewer women, every surviving veteran of the Battle of Terra, no matter how scarred, was present.

Foremost they saw Jaghatai Khan, the great rider, afoot as he lead by the reins a giant among horses, a steed so mighty as to carry even a Primarch, the saddle empty. It was a grand saddle, wrought in the style of an empire so long gone that only the Emperor himself could have identified it. For reasons unexplained, a bow - the finest of bows, created by a master bowyer and archer (he who led the horse) - was strapped to the saddlebow.

And thus they saw the great gold-inlayed coffin.

And thus they saw Lion El'Jonson upon the left, robes of black around him, face scarred by sword and soul by betrayal.

And thus they saw Leman Russ upon the right, stern-faced and wrapped furs that bore still the stains of his kinfolk's blood.

And thus they saw Ferrus Manus upon the left, one steel hand holding the handle of the coffin, the other arm ending barely below the elbow.

And thus they saw Angron upon the right, eyes distant and fixed upon who knew what, a long tabard of blue covering scarred battleplate.

And thus they saw Mortarion upon the left, pale of face, eyes red-rimmed and a crown of Nostraman obsidian held loosely in the fingers of his left hand.

And thus they saw Serenity, alone of the six placing her shoulder beneath the edge of the coffin to bear its terrible weight. She wore white, as ever, but a silken veil now covered her face.

And thus they came to the gates of the Palace Imperial and marched through them to the mausoleum, to which Roboute Guilleman was only now adding the final touches.

And thus the man Kadmon came forever home.

* * *

There was an Astartes in my office.

That's not really unheard of. Most of the Ordos work with the Space Marine Legions at one time or another. Generally I meet them in briefing halls or armouries since they're sized better for them than my rather cluttered private office. Or on the battlefield however. I try to avoid getting personally involved in those situations, but it's not always avoidable.

Still, sometimes it's wise to speak more intimately with a senior officer and the chamber is suitable for that sort of atmosphere. Which does not mean it's 'like a boudoir' if your mind follows the path of one of my more filthy-minded subordinates. I have other chambers for that sort of thing.

This Astarte was uninvited however. In fact he'd been here without my knowledge.

I had my plasma pistol aimed at his face before I even took the time to identify the markings on his armour.

"Please don't," he ordered politely. And it was an order. The pistol was lowered before I realised it. Damn. Not psychic force - doesn't work on me. Just authority.

He was old, I realised, by the standards of Astartes. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of years old. His armour was Mark IV - the sort only worn by the most elite champions in this day and age. I could see scores of honour badges worked into it and more tellingly, thousands of scratches and scars that artificers could have expunged but instead had left in token of the deeds associated with them.

The iconography was typical of XII Legion and the colours were White and Blue.

Angron's own Chapter.

My breath was regulated by long years of discipline but somehow I was sure that I betrayed myself with some tic or twitch. The corner of the Astarte's mouth moved slightly.

"It wouldn't have accomplished anything and you might have damaged something of yours," he pointed out. "Inquisitor Winter Laertes. Officially part of the Ordo Hereticus, unofficially part of the Ordo Praetorian."

Frak. He shouldn't know that. No Astartes should know that. Rumour had it that not even all of the Royal Family knew about the Ordo Praetorian.

He leant forwards. "One of our Librarians spotted a pattern. Not a bad pattern. But one we need to address."

Rising to his feet he walked around my desk, herding me around the other side so that I could sit down in my accustomed chair (which he'd pushed against the wall, being far too large for it). The Astartes started into the fireplace for a moment and then gestured with one gauntleted hand. "May I?"

"...go ahead."

His hand twitched and a small stream of burning promethium connected it to the logs in the grate. A moment later the fire was crackling merrily, if smelling somewhat pungent. He sniffed appreciatively. "I love that smell. Anyway, too business."

"This pattern."

"I took the time to read your secret files."

The Ordo were going to torture me to death for the next century.

...wait. I had literally tons of secret files, the fruits of almost a century as an Inqusitior and five decades service to the Throne in one way or another before that. It would have taken even a genius weeks to read them all and surely he'd have been noticed before that long. It's not as if he was a Raven Guard or Night Lord. World Eaters aren't notoriously stealthy.

"Ah... a specific file."

"Not the Inquisition files." His lip twitched again and I realised it was amusement. "We could, of course, but it's not really our business. Your secret files."

Nononononono. He can't mean...

He nodded.

Oh. He's going to kill me then.

I drew myself up and waited for death.

"Dramatist," the Astartes accused. "Behavioural Observations upon the Psychology of the Lords Militiant of the Legions Astartes. Nice title."

Also technically lese majeste. Which remains a capital crime, even for the Ordos Inquisitorialis.

"You're supposed to be inquisitive, but there are limits."

"If you've read my notes then you know why I wrote that."

He nodded. "There are two ways out of this office, Inquisitor Laertes. One is in pieces. The other... well, what do you know about the Ordo Praetorian?"

"As much as anyone inside it, I suppose."

"The Ordo you are _inside_ is little more than a club of Inquisitors with more paranoia than proportion and a bee in their bonnets about the license granted to my kind," he told me kindly. "We tolerate you largely because you occasionally turn up something useful and to a lesser degree because you make a wonderful cover for the real watchdogs upon our activities."

...what?

What?

WHAT THE FRAK!?

"My name is Kharn," the Astartes announced. "You've just been recruited."


	6. Plushie Angron

_A/N: You may have noticed that I don't write Angron much like his canonical self. This is for two reasons: firstly, this is Lovehammer, not Warhammer; secondly, we'd not really seen canon Angron much when the Lovehammer stories were being written. The Horus Heresy books hadn't reached his appearances yet. So two parts I wrote set the tone for Angron as a LARGE HAM. Firstly, Saga of the Angry One. Secondly, the plushie Angron that Serenity gave to a little girl._

_Well. Clearly Plushie Angron would have adventures of his own...?_

* * *

It's well known that the warp is shaped by living emotion.

It's less known that belief plays a role as well.

The nascent daemon was trying to find out where Serenity had come from. This wasn't unique. Untold billions of minor daemons were doing the same, in the sure knowledge that whoever provided the Four with the knowledge would be rewarded beyond measure. Or eaten. The two were not mutually contradictory.

There were two things that made this one different, however.

The first was that this daemon was among those being shaped primarily by human beliefs, part of the long, slow and inevitable process of forming a Warp God in the image of the Imperium of Man (a process being slowed to a glacial crawl by that irritating mortal hogging all the fun). This particular khorneling was being drawn to images of violence within human children.

The second was that the daemon was very close to successfully managing the whole multiversal transposition business. Not through any particular genius, just by, in metaphorical terms, tripping over a crack.

And without figuring out how to report this partial success - multiversal transit accomplished, incorrect multiversal destination. Khornelings weren't known for thinking these things through.

As it transited, the daemon shifted a little further towards its end form.

"How cute!" Arf declared, seeing the stuffed toy.

Fate was buying a gift for her mother when they returned to hand over the Jewel Seeds that the two of them had gathered. Generously, she'd also given Arf a little spending money for herself.

The teenaged market stall clerk stared in appreciation as the busty redhead bent over to pick the doll up. It was white with blue shoulders and he guessed it was supposed to be some sort of soldier since it had two swords. Then Arf pressed it against her bosom and thought was something that escaped the boy, not to return until much, much later.

"It's so cuddly!" the familiar announced and held it up towards the clerk. "How much?"

"T-take it!" he half-shouted. "It's a gift!"

"Really?" Arf bounced in excitement. The boy's eyes tracked her movements. "Thank you!" And then she rushed off, the clerk not even bothering to wonder at the tail escaping from her tight shorts in excitement.

Fate cried out as her mother brought the whip down against her. Through the shock she heard a strange tooting sound. Had she been more familiar with earth culture she might have recognised the bugle signal for a charge, as produced from a kazoo.

And then Precia Testarossa was attacked by an eight inch tall toy Angron.

* * *

Ahriman burst into the chamber, responding to his lord's cry of alarm.

What he found brought the sorcerer to an astounded halt.

Magnus the Red, sometimes known as the Crimson King, was rolling across the floor locked in combat against... a plush Angron.

"Not the face, not the face!" Magnus screamed as he tried to wrench the ferocious toy away from him. "Ira! Ahriman! Help me!"

Ahriman glanced around and saw Ira studying the scene with a certain amused detachment. "I wouldn't dream of interupting the boys at play," she told him, merriment in her eyes.

The chief librarian nodded and fled, closing the doors behind him. Then after a moment's thought he ordered the security detachment around the Primarch's quarters doubled. Magnus and Ira's kinky games were none of his concern but he didn't want any Sisters getting ideas.


	7. Snippets of Crack

_A/N: In no particular order, little snippets of crazy. As before, reading the posted sections under Lovehammer Inc may help with understanding these._

* * *

Angron stared down at the little girl. "Mortarion has a daughter?" he asked.

"I am Mortarion," the girl stated in a monotone.

He looked at Persephone who nodded in confirmation. "Ah." Angron scratched his head for a moment and them picked up Mortarion by the scruff of her neck and placed her on Persephone's shoulder.

"What are you doing?" the Senshi asked.

Angron held up his helmet. "Pictures," he explained, setting the optical sensors to record as he aimed them towards the pair.

* * *

In theory Angron was supposed to let Horus go through the humiliation of fighting youma in a short skirt. He wasn't very good at that part though: for one thing he wasn't sure why the skirt was supposed to be embarassing - it was basically a kilt and he'd worn those for years since they were easier to repair than trousers. Also letting someone else do the fighting was boooooring.

In this particular case Angron dived headlong off the side of a building, bungee rope trailing behind his feet, skirt riding 'up' his thighs in a way that would have embarassed a real girl (and that gave Nefer nightmares). The carefully measured rope slowed Angron to a halt at precisely the right height behind the youma.

He quickly wrapped his brawny arms around the monster and roared in delight as the tension in the rope dragged them up the side of the building. He used the youma as a cushion against the friction of the brickwork, which didn't seem to do it any good.

When they came to rest, perhaps halfway up, Angron deposited the stunned and somewhat abraded youma on a window ledge while he bent at the waist, reached up and grabbed the rope with one hand and unknotted it from his ankles with the other.

"Who are you?" the youma demanded, somewhat hysterically. Being grabbed like that seemed to have knocked their customary arrogance out of it for the moment. "What do you want?"

"I'm Sailor Angron!" Angron replied cheerily, although he kept his voice down a little, just in case Horus noticed him. It was amusing watching Sailor Horus quarter the streets looking for the missing youma with increasing paranoia. Maybe this was what Night Haunter found so... entertaining. "You're going to be my _special friend_."

The youma didnt know exactly what that meant but judging by the look in the bizarre Sailor's eyes, it was time to whimper in terror. Ignoring this, Angron lashed the end of the rope around the youma's ankles and began climbing the building side, hauling the rope and youma up behind him.

He was quite oblivious to the hundreds of photos that were taken of his barely covered rear during this process and would remain oblivious since Fulgrim considerately hunted down and punished the perpetrators before the photos were placed on the internet.

* * *

It had started out quite innocently. Two Blood Ravens had happened to be present when Persephone needed extra pairs of hands to carry the lamps she'd just purchased.

Then they got lost and called in a Thunderhawk to carry the three of them back to orbit.

It was, admittedly, an error of judgement not to explain to the pilot that they were taking Lady Persephone back to Primarch Mortarion's flagship and not to the Blood Raven Battle Barge.

That did not justify the Death Guard launching a boarding action to rescue their little sister though.

"My brothers," the Chapter Master observed solemnly. "I'm beginning to worry about our reputation."

* * *

"...and when the patient woke up, his whole skeleton was gone and the Doctor was never heard from again." Fabius broke into cackling laughter.

Solomon paused and then also chuckled. It was a fairly amusing story, after all, gruesome though it was.

After a moment the Apothecary leant forwards on the operating table, holding Eidolon's primary heart in his free hand. "Anyway, that's how I lost my medical license."

The Sergeant's chuckle cut off but before he could enquire there was a chirping from inside his ribcage.

"Archimedes!" Fabius glared angrily at the servo skull. "No!" The semi-intelligent device lifted itself out of the wound and scooted away on its anti-gravity propulsion. "It's filthy in there," the apothecary shouted after the device. "Ugh. Machines!"

Solomon considered his fellow member of Legion III's bedside manner rather eccentric at best. But this was the first time he'd ever contemplated his chances of running away from him. They weren't good. His injuries were severe: a mere mortal would long since have died.

Jamming the heart onto a many-pronged cybernetic implant of some kind, Fabius reached for one of the many invasive looking medical contraptions above the table. "Now, most hearts couldn't withstand this voltage but I'm fairly certain yours -"

There was a sudden squelching sound and Fabius shut up.

"What was that noise?"

"The sound of progress, my friend," Fabius replied, turning around to a cabinet. "Ah, perfect." He returned with the heart - at least Solomon presumed it was the same heart. It looked... larger. "Where was I? Ah, there we go." He held it up again. "Come on... come on..." He burst out laughing as the organ began to beat in his hand.

"Oh. That looks good." Solomon was not happy at how surprised the Apothecary seemed to be to be saying that.

"Should I be awake for this?"

"Well... no. But as long as you are..." The Chief Apothecary dropped the heart back into the chest cavity and plunged his hands in after it. "Could you hold your ribcage open a bit? I can't seem..."

Solomon screamed as Fabius twisted the heart into position, less from that than the fact one of his ribs had come away in his hands.

"Oh don't be such a baby. Ribs grow back."

I'm never letting this lunatic treat me again, Solomon pledged privately to himself.

* * *

Persephone deployed her deadliest weapons: big, pleading eyes. "Please."

Mortarian's counter was a non-committal grunt that wasn't agreement or refusal.

"Oh go on," Sanguinius prodded him. "Say it."

"I will if you will."

Sanguinius's eyes grew slightly panicked. Persephone turned her puppy-dog eyes upon him and the leader of the Blood Angels folded faster than a pack of cards. "Alright, but no recording this." He glared discreetly over Perspehone's head at Mortarion. "And you go first."

Mortarion's mouth worked as he built up some phlegm. Sanguinius and Persphone moved out of direct line. Their brother was something of a perfectionist. "Lets get dangerous," he spat, to Perspehone's applause.

Then he smirked slightly at Sanguinius. "Your turn."

The winged Primarch shuffled forwards, looming over Persephone and then leant down to look at her, holding out his hand, two fingers crossed. "Repeat after me: This world!"

"This world," she repeated obediently, trying not to giggle.

"Is Made Of!"

"Is made of!"

"LOVE AND PEACE!"

"Love and Peace!" she squealed and then hugged his leg for a moment before returning to Mortarion's lap.

* * *

The wedding had come as a surprise to the imperial family. Invitations had been sent out with calculated speed so that the majority of them would only barely be able to arrive in time, and had been terse to the point of bluntness: the wedding would take place whether they were there or not.

The invitations hadn't even named the _bride_.

Admittedly, secretiveness was not entirely surprising when coming from Alpharius.

The vast cathedral-like wedding hall was filled with guests from around the galaxy. Perturabo calculated on first entering that at least half were agents of the Alpha Legion in disguise. He had only revised the numbers upwards since that moment and had only been persuaded not to teleport himself and Tekhne back to his flagship when his wife reminded him that with so much of the imperial family in one place the level of security might have some point.

The first ten pews on either side of the aisle were reserved for the imperial family, placements calculated partly on the basis of Legion number and partly on seniority, so Lion El'Jonson and Alta were prominent in the first pew on one side and Serenity and Horus effortlessly dominated the other front pew.

The Emperor had not yet arrived, but a particularly large chair had been set aside from him. He had arrived, among the latest to do so, and had immediately been drawn aside by Alpharius. The rest of the family could only hope firstly that this was in order to meet the bride and that secondly the Emperor would form the desired impression of said bride. Whether the desired impression was favourable or not tended to depend on how fond the individual making the wish was of the youngest Primarch.

The other notable absence (at least among those attending - Guilleman had sent sincere regrets that as he was on the other side of the galaxy he would not be able to arrive until at least a week after the ceremony) was Angron. He was certainly present - his equerry was visible among the other high officers of the World Eaters. Of course, the fact that Kharn was swallowing sedative pills as if they were candy was a touch worrying...

At some unseen signal, the music paused and then segued into a more formal note, signalling the beginning of the ceremony. As those gathered ceased conversations, a side door opened and Alpharius entered, wearing not his armour but a ceremonial uniform in the violet and blue of his Legion. Towering at his side was Angron, wearing a formal white tunic, crimson jacket and a kilt of blue and white tartan. (Thora grabbed her husband's ear just before he was about to unleash a mocking wolf-whistle at the sight of his brother's bare calfs. Whatever she then whispered into his ear had him pale).

When they took positions indicating that Angron was acting as aide (or 'best man' in some traditions) to Alpharius, heads began to turn towards the back of the chamber where the great doors were slowly swinging open.

The Emperor entered, the bride upon his arm. The bride was veiled and wore a long white dress while the Emperor, as majestic as ever, seemed totally unperturbed. Only the more psychically astute - Magnus and Ira for example, could tell his emotions were in tumoil. Horrified disbelief was Magnus' later theory. Ira countered with her own belief that the Emperor was trying not to laugh out loud. Their debate would eventually last all through the night and end, during breakfast, with a negotiated settlement that both theories were probably correct.

Eyes widened as vision keen beyond mortal levels dissected the identity of Alpharius' chosen bride. Reactions varied - Lorgar fainted, Fulgrim tutted disapprovingly and Azmina smugly noted to herself that she'd won a bet with Sanguinius.

The magistrate - a local official visibly emoting utter terror in playing a prominient role in such distinguished company - cleared his throat as the Emperor escorted the bride to the front of the chamber. "If any of you know cause or just impediment why these two persons should not be joined together in matrimony, you are to declare it."

There was a pregnant silence.

A number of the imperial family considered strongly the option of raising objections on various grounds that they were fairly sure would be upheld. For one reason or another, they decided not to.

These reasons were:-

The Emperor was participating, thus at least tacitly approving.

Angron was glaring challengingly at the rest of the room, daring them to object.

Raising an objection would be a terrible, probably irretrievable insult to Alpharius.

For most of them, however, the most driving reason was the tears of happiness and radiated approval of Serenity. The Anima was emoting so much support for the wedding that Alpharius was actually not shooting suspicious glances in her direction, an unprecendented situation.

Lorgar probably would not have been swayed by these factors but he remained unconscious, propped up by Kor Phareon in a pretense that nothing unusual had happened in that pew.

When the silence grew too long (as determined by Angron turning his death glare upon the magistrate and opening his mouth to speak, that unlucky soul spoke swiftly: "Primarch Alpharius of XX Legion, the Alpha Legion, do you take Omegon, also Primarch of the Alpha Legion, to be your spouse...?"


	8. Heresy & Rebirth Part 1

_A/N: Eventually I had a stab at my own continuity, one where the Primarchs reincarnate Senshi style._

* * *

"HELLO BROTHER."

Horus turned and saw Angron standing in the doorway, flanked by a pair of World Eaters in terminator armour. "You? I was expecting more impressive guests."

"GUARD THE DOORS," the loyal primarch ordered his sons and without question the duo stepped back and closed the entrance. "FATHER IS ON HIS WAY. I ARRANGED FOR HIM TO BE TELEPORTED SOME DISTANCE AWAY FROM YOU."

"Let me guess, you want to try to reason with me?"

Angron gave him a blank look.

"Ah yes, I had forgotten. So why did you ensure that you reached me first?" Horus asked mockingly. He drew his sword, a daemonblade as long as he was tall. The weapon screamed in bloodlust as it detected Angron's presence.

Horus' brother stepped forwards. "FATHER WOULD PROBABLY TRY TO REASON WITH YOU. HE'S TOO MUCH LIKE SERENITY SOMETIMES."

"But you aren't, of course."

"I AM NOT A WISE MAN, BUT I AM A STRONG ONE AND I KNOW YOU HAVE COME TOO FAR FOR WORDS TO CHANGE YOUR MIND."

"So that's it?" Horus chuckled. "You've come here to spare father the pain of confronting me? Do you think I'l believe you could be so 'noble'?"

His brother smiled, baring sharpened teeth. "WELL... HAVEN'T YOU EVER WONDERED WHO WOULD WIN BETWEEN THE TWO OF US?" Angron asked, drawing his swords.

Horus gave his brother an amused look. "No."

Horus yanked at the hilt of his sword to remove it from Angron's body. If it wasn't so horrible, the Emperor might have been amused that the sword failed to move.

"I see my brother seems too fond of my sword to relinquish it." Horus released the hilt and then picked up Angron's remaining blade. "I trust he will have no objection to my borrowing this." He paused as if waiting for Angron to respond. "How generous," he murmured when no response came.

The Emperor spoke a word of power and his loyal son's sword shattered in the hand of the traitor, shards piercing Horus' hands through his gauntlets.

* * *

The echoing hall had once been lined with fluted columns and bedecked with hundreds of banners heralding the triumphs of Horus Lupercal, Primarch and Warmaster. While it could have been ascribed to egotism on the part of the arch-traitor, the fact was that the chamber had been furnished entirely at the behest of his sister, as a museum to exhibit his accomplishments to the Terran masses.

Now the columns (fortunately more ornamental than structural) had mostly been smashed, the banners torn down and the tens of thousands of artifacts ravaged.

When news of the Heresy had been confirmed, thousands of those who had once walked through the galleries had returned and visited the petty vengeance that they could upon the representation of Horus. And then the avaricious had descended to strip away the gems and precious metals before the forces of law and order (curiously absent) stepped in to prevent further anarchy.

Probably most of those who profited from the vandalism were dead now.

The vast frame hung from the wall at one end of the hall had once held a vast oil portraiture of Horus and Serenity, the Primarch standing in full armour behind the Anima's chair. Half of the oil painting was still slightly in evidence, though much burned, but the half portraying the Emperor's Daughter had been torn away.

Horus briefly wondered where it was.

There were a thousand feet treading the scored and savaged marble of the museum once more, debris from the mob's leavings and from more than a year without repair to the gaping holes that had once been stained glass windows under their boots. The hall could have played host to a crowd of ten thousand men and women and often had, but with more than five hundred armoured space marines it felt crowded enough.

The armour was not the pale green Mark IV or Mark V suits that Horus was accustomed to seeing around him. A few of the one-time Sons of Horus had reverted to the ivory and the former name of his legion, but none of them stood amongst that crowd. They were the handful who had held true when all about them had not and they had no place here in a broken hall with broken men.

Broken in faith.

Broken in soul.

Broken, in many cases, in body.

But injured, heartbroken or simply foresworn of allegiance of first Loyalist and then of the Traitors, survivors of the Sons of Horus, of the Emperor's Children, of the Word Bearers and even in some rare cases the Alpha Legion had gathered in this hall and donned battleplate from the relatively well-stocked armoury now contained within the few weatherproof rooms in the structure.

Mark II and Mark III armour without exception, the suits were piecemeal but functional, a handful of technically skilled marines having supplemented individual capability. But they were uniform in one other respect.

Each was black, without marking of rank or status save for an engraved X or C in the brow of certain amongst them. Leaders of ten or a hundred, Sergeants or Captains as the other Legions would have it.

Even Horus wore the same unadorned plate, albeit armour always intended for his frame, notably larger than that a space marine. This, like all the suits of power armour and the weapons that accompanied them, had been provided to him by Rogal Dorn.

"You are not forgiven," the Emperor's Praetorian had told him flatly when he accompanied the shipment. "I have no brother by your name."

Filthy from days wandering the ruined galleries, eyes red from tears such as he had never thought to shed, knuckles actually raw from beating at the walls until one wing had collapsed outright upon him, Horus had merely stared at the wargear in confusion.

Dorn's jaw had worked for a moment before he spoke again. "The Emperor still speaks, sometimes. Scribes take it all down."

Well of course they would.

"'Horus Lupercal shall perish leading his black legion in crusade'," the Primarch of the Imperial Fists had recited with relish. "Guilleman and the others may believe that death is too good for you, but I have no such illusions. Death and whatever waits for you there is a fitting punishment for treason. And something must be done for those of your followers who claim to be repentant."

And so they stood there. Not even a single Great Company in size, many of them still bearing wounds of battles fought in his name and that of...

Horus shook his head and rose to his feet. It was time.

But before he could say a word there was the sound of armoured feet and marines turned (the older models of their armour not allowing their helmets to turn at all) to see the new arrivals filing through the doors.

Unlike those already arrived, these marines wore dark green and where not obscured with hasty daubs of paint it was clear that they had once worn the winged sword of a legion.

None of Horus' men were armed with more than bolt pistols or knives but all those arriving carried full wargear, a vastly superior panoply. Though outnumbered five to one, they would pose a formidable threat if they came in violence.

But no.

To Horus it was all too plain, even through their armour. These men were lost, looking not for enemies but for a road to follow. And the man in the lead was...

Stalking quickly through the crowd, he brought the new arrival's advance to a halt. There was no mistaking Horus after all.

No more than there was mistaking the sword carried by their leader.

His hands went first to the butts of the pistols at his hips, not to the blade. It was not his sword to draw. That he even carried it spoke poorly of the Dark Angels' circumstances.

There was a rustle amongst the crowd and four space marines moved to flank Horus, each wearing a C upon their helm. Reluctantly, he stepped back as the Dark Angel removed his helm, revealing a weary face.

"We are the Mournival," the four spoke as one.

"I am Cypher."

Horus' own helm was bare of any marking.

He who had once led would now follow.

Until his sister was saved, his father's promise could not be allowed to come to fruition.

* * *

Battle-scored armour still moved smoothly as Horus walked out of view of the rest of Black Legion. There had been four companies devoted to this conflict and the Lord General had used them, used them up, as ruthlessly as he ought have. Only eighty still lived and the Centurions and Decurions had led from the front and for the most part died doing their duty.

There had been a handful of his Astartes that had risen to the challenge. Names that he could recommend to the Mournival for promotion to Decurion. But now, alone for the first time in weeks, there was something else that he wanted to do.

The hab-block he'd spotted was derelict and abandoned. But not all of it was gone and, entering through a hole that had undoubtedly resulted from a stray artillery shell, he was able to find a more or less intact bathroom. The door wasn't designed for an Astartes, much less for Horus' imposing height - in fact nor were the ceilings! - but somehow he managed to scramble through without doing too much damage to the doorway and plant himself on the floor, life support pack hard against the porcelain and one knee raised so he could cram a leg into the bath.

Then he took his helm in both hands and slowly worked it loose from gorget. It didn't come easily - damage from one clash or another. He could have torn it free, felt the temptation, but instead took the time to do it right. Impatience had its own price.

Freed at last from its confines he set the helm gently aside in the bathtub and twisted to examine his face in the mirror. There had been a time when he had believed himself and his family bright and impervious to the ravages of the universe. The lined face and stubble of silvering hair gave a lie to that.

"You are old, Horus Lupercal," he told the face.

The years did not matter - he could have calculated the years, days, seconds since his life began. Did so without effort and then dismissed the number as meaningless. It was the moments since that sight of golden and silver light intermingled as they descended from the skies of Cthonia that mattered.

Moments of triumph across the battlefield and negotiating table.

Moments of peace and pleasure shared with father and beloved sister.

Moments of joy and - finally - understanding with brothers who understood him as neither father nor sister nor even sons born of his own geneseed ever good.

Moments of grim calculation, of misled determination, of tragically arrogant sins.

Moments of shame and surrender under the condemning gaze the battered and savaged globe that had been the most brilliant jewel of the Imperium. Followed inexorably by more moments - faces turned away, pained and awkward conversation...

Of seeing others follow him into the fires, believing somehow that what they did was expiation of sins that they barely understood. Of watching generals who were merely human fumble their way to victories bought wastefully in the blood of soldiers who deserved better, to defeats avoidable had the right man been in command... and knowing that this too was his punishment.

The one who had been Morningstar to the Imperium allowed himself another moment now. A single tear.

And then he worked his way out of the small chamber, one limb at a time. It really was far too small for him to have made use of, but for that very reason it was private. There had even been a dusty towel that removed any evidence of emotion - useful because the helm wasn't going to be donned again without the aid of an armourer.

One of the Mournival was outside the hab, waiting for him in front of a black-painted Stormbird. How they had found him - even why they had come to this world was a mystery. Horus had created the Mournival but they had evolved into something that he did not entirely understand. It was a feeling that his father might have shared with him. This one, he thought, had once been of Roboute's Legion: Uriel.

"Centurion," the Mournival directed - unflinching at the sight of the Primarch's bared face, a face that had once sent men and supermen instinctively to their knees. "The Black Legion are called to Cthonia."

Cthonia? To the home of the Lunar Wolves? Not in aeons had any one of the Black Legion traveled there. Even the Mournival would not presume unless...

Horus clapped the helm back over his head. It didn't need to seal in order for him to use the vox. "Black Legion, report immediately to my position. We are called to war."


	9. Heresy & Rebirth Part 2

The codes that admitted the ship through the orbital defenses were ancient.

If the registry was to be believed, the ship itself was even older - a Strike Frigate built for the Space Wolves to replace vessels lost during the immediate aftermath of the Heresy and condemned as unsalvageable sometime in the 33rd Millenium.

When Ragnar Blackmane learned the pedigree of the Stormbird that settled upon an icy platform jutting out from the Fang, he was impressed to learn that it had been constructed on Terra itself, before the Great Crusade, as part of the initial equipment of what was then known only as the VI Legion of the Astartes.

"Who's aboard that thing?" Gunnar asked, looking at the large transport settling uneasily onto the platform. While there was in theory enough room for it, the ice made the landing hazardous.

Beside the Wolf Lord, Ranek crossed his arms across his chest. "That's what we're here to find out."

"You could get the whole Great Company aboard a ship that large," the Wolf Guard grumbled. "How do we know this isn't another of Madox's tricks?"

"We don't," Egil told him.

Ragnar shook his head, setting his topknot swaying. "The codes are genuine. The Great Wolf woke half the Ancients to check their authenticity. He wouldn't tell me what they said."

"That's keeping things awfully close to his chest."

"He usually has his reasons." Ragnar stepped forwards as the Stormbird settled at last and the engines began to spool down. "And we'll find out who's aboard any minute now."

The four Space Wolves fanned out slightly as they advanced towards the forward hatch of the troop transport, automatically spacing themselves so that no sudden assault could overwhelm them at once. However, the hatch lowered slowly, unlike the sudden crash typical of the Thunderhawks that they were more accustomed to. Either the machine-spirit was exhausted, possible in a craft so old, or those aboard were deliberately taking their time in order to avoid the appearance of aggression.

Shadows inside masked the face of the Astartes standing at the top of the ramp but it was clear immediately that he was a giant even by those standards and wore armour the same grey that adorned that of the Space Wolves in front of him.

When he stepped forwards into the light, Ragnar got an impression of an ivory mane of hair and a beard woven into long braids, but what caught his attention were the eyes. Golden eyes.

Wolf eyes.

The new arrival bared his lips, revealing the unmistakeable long fangs of an aged Space Wolf. "Your welcome is not warm, warriors."

"Nor is Fenris, as you should recall," Egil replied when neither Wolf Lord nor Wolf Priest seemed inclined to respond.

"It has always welcomed me."

Ragnar remembered the feel of a spear in his hands. He had seen this man portrayed a thousand times but now he faced the reality.

"Russ..." he murmured.

The Wolf-King nodded solemnly. "Aye."

That simple word elicited gasps from Egil and Gunnar but Ranek sank to one knee, gesturing sharply for the two Wolf Guard to follow suit. Only Ragnar stood face to chest with his ultimate progenitor as a second giant, this one cloaked and hooded in black, stepped forwards to join the conversation.

"Why have you returned, after all these centuries?"

A thin smile touched the ancient Primarch's face. "A wolf-time is upon the imperium. An age of strife and darkness, but also an age of great deeds. Such things require... preparation. The gathering of lore, the forging of weapons... the assembly of heroes."

He stepped forwards, his companion remaining at the hatch. Lights flickered behind them, illuminating capsule after capsule, each marked by the eerie stillness of a stasis field. "My lost brothers have much to learn about themselves," Russ observed forbodingly as he set foot on the stone of Fenris for the first time in nine eons.

* * *

It seemed as if Russ had only been on Fenris for a few moments, although he knew looking back that he had stayed there for almost a standard month after Corax left aboard their faithful ship the [i]Redemption of the Fallen[/i] to see to the wellbeing of his own Legion. Perhaps when matters here were done, Russ could return home once more.

"I must be getting old," he confided to Ranek, who had been detached by Ragnar to accompany him on this journey.

The old Wolf Priest refrained from smiling. "If it were not for your fangs, I would mistake you for a stripling Blood Claw in need of firm guidance, Wolf King."

"It's my youthful charm that does it," Russ agreed and kicked open the door.

Fifty thousand petitioners and Administratium clerks scattered as the Primarch sprinted along the mile-wide hallway, Ranek panting for breath as he tried his best to keep up.

At the far end of the hall, four more-than-human eyes assessed the approaching giant and raised their guardian spears before bringing the butts of the lances down up on the floor with such terrific force (the plaform beneath the door the guarded was reinforced against just such impacts) that the floor boomed like a drum. "[b]Hail to the Wolf King, Primarch of the VI Legion, Son of the Emperor, Leman Russ approaches,[/b]" they cried out in unison.

Russ skidded to a halt in front of them. "Hah, one of these days I'll make it here before you finish that spiel!" He glanced at the towering doors, each panel so large that life sized statues of long forgotten potentates were carved into them, each in fabulously expensive materials that might once have represented their wealth or their places of origin. Even the Wolf King did not remember who they were, although Horus or Serenity might have. "Are you going to let me in?"

The Custodes brought their lances down again again. "Wolf Priest of the VI Legion, Counsellor to Wolf Lord Ragnar Blackmane, Aide to the Primarch Leman Russ, Ranek approaches!" they intoned solemnly as the Space Wolf caught up.

Only then did the Custodes step aside to allow the doors to open, admitting the pair into the the towering antechamber that seperated the outer hall of the Imperial Palace, the portions open to freely to the noble and affluent of the Imperium, to the chanceries occupied by the administrators and politicans who directly executed the commands of the Terran Council.

Ranek had never visited the palace before and while he had heard and believed the tales, nothing really prepares you for a chamber large enough for an Imperator Titan to stand within. He knew it was that large because to reach the antechamber's other door (which he could see were guarded by Astartes in bronze-trimmed black and grey) he would have to walk between the legs of just such a Titan.

"I think I've fought campaigns that didn't involve walking such distances," he grumbled. "Haven't you people heard of Rhinos?"

"They wreck the carpets," Russ explained. "Serenity wouldn't speak to Jaghatai and Lion for a solid month after they had a race."

"Landspeeders then?"

The doors crashed closed behind them, to the sound of Russ laughing.

The Custodes were silent. Of course, they didn't [i]need[/i] to speak to know what the other was thinking. Working together for ten eons helps with that.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN THE STAIRS ARE TOO STEEP!" Ranek's howl was audible despite the thickness of the doors.

* * *

Ranek was certain he'd have got to their destination faster if he'd brought a jumppack and a chainsword. As an added bonus he would get to kill some of the Iron Warriors who were guarding this particular section of the palace. The Imperieal Palace's protection was vested in the Custodes and beyond them, the Luna Wolves and a handful of rigorously screened regiments of the Imperial Guards. The presence of the Iron Warriors was nothing to do with the Palace and everything to do with the person that Russ had come here to see.

The first thing that the Wolf Priest saw inside the office was scale model of the Imperial Palace. It was about the size of a Baneblade and on closer inspection was entirely made out of data slates. He could only assume that some of the Iron Warriors were very, very bored.

"Are you trying to surpass Dorn's masterpiece?" Russ called, walking around the pile.

"Russ. What brings you here?" Ranek was startled by the sight of the man at the giant desk behind the dataslates. In size, he was nearly equal to the Wolf-King and his grey robes were matched by slate-grey hair and pallid compexion. "It's only been nine thousand years, you can't have gallivanted around more than half of the Imperium in that time."

Leman Russ did not appear concerned by the venom in the other Primarch's voice. "I'm here to see you, brother."

"Why, did you get Corax killed as well?"

Ranek gasped.

"No Perturabo. He's on his way back to the Raven Guard, to resume their leadership." Russ' voice was patient.

"So you've given up at last." Peturabo used a stylus to scratch a signature onto the slate he was reading. "I'd be more sympathetic if you hadn't got Vulkan and Jaghatai killed in your chasing after ghosts and phantoms."

There was an edge in the primarch's voice as he replied: "I didn't give up. I'm done because we finished our quest."

Perturabo used the stylus to scratch at his brow. "Now you're just being ridiculous."

"And you're hiding behind ornamental dataslates."

"That," he pointed at the scuplture, "Is. My. In-tray. It might be a little by smaller if certain people had handled their responsibilities instead of running off."

"And it won't even be your responsibility once Serenity returns! Have faith, brother!"

Ranek saw what might have been the slightest trace of moisture in the corner of Perturabo's eyes. "She isn't coming back, Russ. After all this time how can you still be clinging to that notion?"

"How can you not? You've read Konrad's prophecies and even aside from that; you knew our sister even longer than I did. How can you imagine that she would not be just as determined to return as we are to find her."

Perturabo's fist crashed into the desk. "Face reality Russ! This is the Imperium," he gestured fiercely at the slates, causing the Iron Warrior replenishing the heap on his desk to duck reflexively. "War on a hundred fronts, and when those are done an army of bureaucrats to be sent in with mops to make good the damage. It isn't the old days, there are no grand crusades any more! There's just me and billions depending on me to hold the universe together! I don't have time for your nonsense!"

"No one's saying what you've done hasn't been important," Russ said, trying to be gentle. "You're doing a grand job, but there needs to be hope."

The other Primarch didn't seem to hear him, instead stabbing one finger at various slates. "If I don't handle this then half a sector starves. This one goes wrong and two sectors will follow Ultramar's example..."

"What's he talking about?"

Ranek grimaced. "About half the sectors on the Eastern Fringe are sending their tithes to Macragge not Earth. The Ultramarines Legion claims it's to foster greater efficiency..."

"I thought they broke up after Guilleman got put in stasis."

"Uh, they formed a grand conclave and formed a loose federation of Chapters in the early 39th Millenium."

"Hmm, the things you miss..." Russ shook his head. "I'll take care of the Ultramarines," he said in a louder voice.

Perturabo broke off from ranting. "You'll what?"

"I said, I'll handle them. Father created the Space Wolves to manage rogue Astartes. That makes Ultramar my responsibility."

The other Primarch laughed bitterly. "You think they'll listen? I had a job stopping them from burning your precious Fenris to the bedrock after that stunt you pulled trying to sabotage the stasis field around Guilleman."

Russ shrugged. "If he doesn't die, he can't be reborn. It's why only thirteen of our brothers have been reborn. Anyway, I'll make them listen."

"DON'T YOU DARE START [b]ANOTHER[/b] CIVIL WAR!" Perturabo roared, surging to his feet.


	10. Heresy & Rebirth Part 3

The twelve of them stood on the gallery overlooking the entrance hall and watched as Astartes entered. There had been thirteen of them last time, but Matthias, who Leman Russ had code-named Regis, had been the one called forward to be taken away by the red-armoured Astartes who arrived the month before. The Thousand Sons, they had been called. Teleute remembered Matthias questioning the Wolf Priests about the other Legions and their complexity, his dismay when they had refused him access to a library, claiming that there was no such store of written lore anywhere in the ancient fortress.

So naturally, the one who could have identified the legion or chapter (she wasn't entirely clear on the distinction) of the new arrivals was gone first, leaving them to guess. If she wasn't the one selected this time, Teleute swore she would question the Priests and force everyone else to memorise the basic colour schemes of the original Legions.

"Does anyone remember which legions use white?" she asked and then saw that while the leading Astartes were wearing white power armour, there was a cluster of four at the back wearing black. "Or black - are two Legions arriving at once?"

Dorias ducked behind her and crammed into a corner between her and a wall, ducking his head to avoid visibility. "I don't know," he muttered, "But whoever they are, I hope they call for me. Or Umi. Is she...?" He looked around furtively.

"Stay down," Teleute hissed as she saw the other girl scanning the group. Leman Russ, who claimed to be their brother (how that worked, Teleute had no idea: she'd spent most of the first week in his company caught between religious awe and dread that somehow she'd done something terrible and his legendary wrath would suddenly be directed at her) had designated Umi as Predator and it was an apt choice. All the feral girl seemed interested in was food, fighting and... well there was a reason Dorias tried to avoid her, although he didn't put up much resistance on the occasions when she did jump him.

"It could be that the ones in black are from a successor Chapter," suggested Prima. "And I think that the White Scars wear white armour." The taller woman sat on Teleute's other side.

Teleute leant forward in her seat, causing Dorias to cringe in case Umi was looking in their direction. "I don't think that these are White Scars. They have a sort of yellow bar in their heraldry don't they? This looks more like... a boar of some kind?"

Prima squinted. "Those aren't tusks," she said and both Teleute and Dorias heard a tremble in her voice. "That's a crescent moon."

"I... don't understand," Dorias muttered.

"The Luna Wolves. The chapter formed by loyalists from the Arch-Traitor's own legion," explained the woman. "Which means that whoever they pick must be..."

Teleute swallowed. "You mean..." She lowered her voice. "Horus?"

Her answer was a nod.

* * *

"Lupercal," the white-clad Commander called and all the breath left Teleute's lungs as she stared at him in denial.

She could easily imagine the thoughts running through everyone else's mind. Firstly: Thank Serenity he didn't call me. Secondly: Wait, Lupercal is Teleute.

Maybe he didn't call me.

Maybe... I misheard him...?

Please, Serenity?

She felt, rather than heard, Dorias moving carefully away from her. When she turned to look at him, there was horror in his eyes.

Looking the other way she couldn't even see Prima, although that was probably because Umi had shoved her way past the others and was now staring at her from a distance of about three inches. "Heeee~ey, does that mean you killed me?"

How in the name of the Emperor does one answer that?

Abesent any verbal response, Umi apparently filled in the blanks and grinned broadly, revealing gaps in her teeth (the Space Wolf's had been muttering about how to replace them without coming to any conclusions Teleute was aware of) and then headbutted her.

There followed Teleute Lupercal's first encounter with the Black Legion when the Mournival were required to forcibly restrain the two girls (because Teleute may have mistakenly let Umi inside her guard and get the first shot in, but she was damned if she was going to let that be the end of the matter).

* * *

Uther spat in Teleute's face when she tried to say goodbye.

The reactions of the others had varied widely. Umi had hugged her and then tried to start a fight. That had been reassuringly normal. If the legends surrounding Angron had grown over time, at least they had never claimed that he was petty. The Primarch that Horus had slain held no grudge.

Dorias had hidden from her. Prima had not. Miriam had been shy (as always) but when Teleute checked her pockets on leaving the other girl's room she had found two slim books tucked inside them - one written about Horus during the Great Crusade and a second about the battle in which he had died, penitent to the end.

Uther's reaction was by far the most adversarial. His faith in the God Emperor was deep and his tolerance for a rebel, even reincarnated, was all but non-existent.

"Understand this," he hissed. "I am reborn of a loyal Primarch and you are a traitor. Do us all a favour and die alongside the other scum of the Black Legion."

Teleute wiped his spittle from her cheek. "Two days ago it hadn't even occured to me that any of us might be traitors," she pointed out. "How do you know that you aren't one?"

He glared at her. "My faith in the God-Emperor is absolute."

"The Primarch called you 'Herald' didn't he?"

Uther nodded. "The herald of Serenity's return."

She shrugged. "Before they found their Primarch, one Legion bore the name 'Imperial Heralds'."

"...which Legion?" he asked, reluctantly, even his disgust yielding to the driving curiousity about which Primarch's soul was also his own."

Teleute turned away. "The Seventeenth," she told him and closed the door before he recalled which Legion bore that number.

Behind her, while Uther screamed denial - that she was lying, that he hated her - of the implication that he was father to the Word Bearers, Teleute wondered uneasily how she had known that tidbit of history.

* * *

Teleute's body was no longer entirely familiar to her.

It was her soul that the Lunar Wolves found valuable. Her body was merely human and this was not, to them, sufficient. Leman Russ had already had biologists from the crimson-clad Adeptus Mechanicum treat her pre-emptively with anti-agathics calculated to slow her aging. To the ancient stronghold world of Cthonia, Master Cuchlain had called blue robed emissaries of the Filia Mercurium who had been studying this matter for some eons.

When Teleute came out of the vat they had placed her in, she crushed the first hand offered to raise her to her feet. She felt terrible about that of course but was even more appalled when she found that the hand had been augmetic. For the weeks it took to learn to regulate herself, only space marines of the Lunar Wolves entered her presence, and that in full battle plate.

According to mirrors she looked much as she had before the process: slim, dark of hair and pale of skin. But she could feel things moving inside her, organs akin in a distant fashion to those implanted in the Space Marines. The cost of them had been incalculable: the ancient secrets used to create the Primarchs and their legions had never been intended for women. Nor were the costs merely fiscal: Fabius Bile himself had sought the lore and thousands upon thousands of the Filia had died screaming under his torments rather than reveal the secrets to Fulgrim's Fleshcrafter. (No one told Teleute of the thousands of volunteers who'd perished in almost equal torment as experimental subjects during the lengthy development process).

Once she had learned a measure of self-control, the backbone of the Chapter and the Legion took her in hand. Sergeants of the Lunar Wolves and Black Legion, as well as three successor Chapters that could also claim Horus as progenitor, put her through a rigorous training regieme calculated to make Teleute ready to fight alongside the Space Marines with boltgun, chainsword and a myriad other weapons. Now, with any error likely to be painful, she truly mastered her new physique and into the nights officers and chaplains moulded her mind, preparing her not only for battle but for leadership in battle.

It was almost a shock when a Captain of the Black Legion summoned her to the docks where a strike cruiser was waiting. It was time for her to see war.

* * *

The battlefield was a strange one.

Thousands of years before the Imperium men had come to the system of Troy. Using vast mirrors they had harnessed the light of a sun and applied it to the nickel-iron asteroids that might at one time have been parts of long dead planets. Applied correctly, the result was bubbles of stone, and a wealth of minerals.

[i]Most[/i] of the asteroids was nickel and iron, both of which were somewhat valuable in the quantities available. Some was other metals far more useful. The Emperor alone could guess how much of the Dark Age of Technology had been built with the metals from Troy.

All of that had been long ago. The mirrors were long gone and the miners who remained could not say what had happened. Conquered by the Great Crusade, they had paid their tithe in minerals scratched from the inside of their hollow homes and otherwise dabbled in piracy when they thought they could get away with it.

That was not the reason that the Black Legion had been sent there.

The reason was that the miners had stopped pirating, which had made the Administratium happy, and started hurling their homes off into the darkness of interstellar space upon fusion torches. Since those giant globes then ceased to send tithes to the Imperium, or to hand their pskyers to the Black Ships, neither the Administratium not the Inquisition was happy with this idea.

Storming aboard the remaining globes was the sort of job that required Space Marines, at least to force beachhead. And since it was the sort of head-on assault that would kill even Space Marines, the first wave of the attack would be carried out by the Black Legion and the second by World Eaters who would have the unspoken orders to use their bolters of the Black Legion balked.

Not that they would, of course. They were under the eyes of their reborn Primarch and more importantly, the Black Legion never had. But some wounds are just too deep.

Teleute would fight with the rear rank of the Black Legion. This was not the usual position for an inexperienced member of the Legion - usually their deployments were well forward so that those who had joined only in search of a place to die would find it quickly, those who desired to continue their service would have opportunity to show their worth and those undecided between the two extremes would be forced to choose.

It had been made clear to Telute that while she was fighting alongside the Black Legion, she was doing so as commander of the XVI Legion and thus her life was not to be given away. Her warplate was therefore the bone-white with black trim of the original Luna Wolves and although outwardly it resembled Mk 8 Power Armour she had learned that the artifice of its construction rendered it almost as durable as the mighty tactical dreadnought armour used by veteran Astartes. And then there was the Iron Halo.

The protection afforded by the suit was remarkable, but given that between her and the enemy were not only the first rank of the Black Legion but also the second rank, made up of hoary veterans that formed the backbone of the Legion, it seemed almost superfluous.

It was a surprise therefore that no sooner had she exited her boarding torpedo than she was shot at.

The stubber slugs exploded in fiery death as they struck the protective field of the Iron Halo and Teleute automatically raised her bolt pistol, dispatching the gunner as her bodyguards eradicated the infiltrator squad that had somehow eluded the first attack groups.

One look at the tactical displays demonstrated to Teleute the validity of the first principle that she'd learned from studying Miriam's gifts: in war, the plan was the first casualty. The outer shells of the globes were over a hundred kloms thick and penetrated only by a maze of interlinking passages and mineshafts. Maps provided for the operation bore little to no relationship with reality.

"Move forward," she ordered tersely, ignoring the shattered remains of the men she'd killed, now almost obscured by the flood of information across her eye-displays. "We will have to penetrate to the core. We can't expect to kill a snake by gnawing on its tail."

* * *

It took almost a week to fight through the outer layer of the globe and that was good progress. Three of the other four assaults had managed to create bridgeheads for Imperial Guard regiments to take over, which had just lead to bogging down of the Guardsmen with brutal losses despite support from World Eaters. The fifth attack had failed outright, the Black Legion laying down their lives to cover the retreat of the support elements.

Teleute had consolidated the Black Legion into this attack and was using the Guardsmen to secure their rear areas. It hadn't stopped casualties but it at least kept them to a manageable level and as a result the Imperial forces now controlled a secure route from an improvised dock to a minehead two hundred kloms away on the inside. Now all they had to do was work out where on the four and a half million square kloms of the inner surface the rebel leaders could be found.

No one had questioned Teleute leading the assault out of the mineshafts although she had appeased any desire to recommend caution by letting the company's two dreadnoughts and squad of terminators take point. There had been seven casualties among that echelon, which had been almost half their losses in the operation. Approximately two thousand rebel soldiers had been killed – the tenuous atmosphere inside the globe was entirely the result of millenia of pollution so the breach of a space suit would have been fatal even if the pressure hadn't been barely greater than that of space outside the globe.

Inside one of the resealed domes that housed the minehead, Teleute was being assisted in repairs to her armour by two techmarines – the assistance being their doing the work while she watched, learned and occasionally held tools for them. Being out of her armour felt strange after six days and she had already made a mental note to bring a bodyglove or robe for this contingency in the future.

She was examining her helmet when Hundred Leader Belisarius entered the chamber. "What do you make of this?" she asked, holding it so he could see the small 'M' that the techmarines had engraved above the brow without asking her. "I'm not sure it's a good idea."

"Was it your idea?" the towering Astartes asked bluntly. Teleute had grown accustomed to being surrounded by near-giants at all times but had to admit to herself that she had been almost embarassingly glad to learn that the XVI Legion had female serfs so that she at least had other women to talk to at times.

"Oh this is their fault." She pointed at the two unrepentant Techmarines.

Belisarius nodded in understanding. "Then it is a good thing, Thousand Leader Teleute." And he saluted. The Black Legion did [i]not[/i] salute their officers.

"Stop that, it's a sniper check," she told him automatically.

"My apologies, Thousand Leader." He didn't sound particularly abashed. "You have guests."

The next person through the hatch was a World Eater officer. Such was the shrouding effect of the battle plate that it wasn't until the white helmet came off that Teleute recognised Umi. The other young woman – young, they must each be past forty now! - had her hair in tight braids flat against her skull and secured at the nape of her neck. "He~ey!" She hugged Teleute which was a nervous moment since she had lightning claws (inactive thankfully) jutting from one of her gauntlets. Enhancements or not, those claws could have torn the unarmoured woman apart with ease. "Help me?"

"Certainly," Teleute agreed quickly. "Ah... what with?"

"My marines!" Umi leant closer and half-whispered into her ear: "So stupid."

Umi was calling someone stupid? Umi? Teleute winced. "Why don't you tell me a little more about this." She relaxed slightly only to tense up as she saw the helmet of the next World Eater to enter was battered as if by some hardened club. One that apparently had an aquila stamped on it just like the reinforced butt of the bolt pistol that sat at Umi's hip.

She could practically feel the glare she received from the World Eater, whose black armour proclaimed him to be a Chaplain.


	11. Sons of Angron

The Sons of the Lion are the heroes who ride out to slay monsters.  
The Sons of Angron know that they are the monsters to their foes.

The Sons of Fulgrim embrace the ideal of perfection in warfare.  
The Sons of Angron believe that war is no ideal.

The Sons of Perturabo built fortresses that they can hold for all eternity.  
The Sons of Angron build staging areas from which to attack.

The Sons of Jaghatai tear at the flanks of their foes.  
The Sons of Angron strike for the heart.

The Sons of Russ stand watch over their own cousins.  
The Sons of Angron eye the Wolf-King's brood and wait the day.

The Sons of Dorn can never be broken.  
The Sons of Angron can never be stopped.

The Sons of Curze inspire fear of what hides in the darkness.  
The Sons of Angron inspire fear in whoever they stand before.

The Sons of Sanguinius fight for the glorious vision of their father.  
The Sons of Angron struggle to restrain the murderous rage of their sire.

The Sons of Ferrus Manus seek to expel weakness from theselves.  
The Sons of Angron desire to be strong where they have been broken.

The Sons of Guilleman seek victory through the mastery of the battlefield.  
The Sons of Angron obtain victory through death of those who stand against them.

The Sons of Mortarion are methodical and deliberate in their strategies.  
The Sons of Angron wait only for the time to attack.

The Sons of Magnus take to the battlefield armed with the infinite armour of their minds.  
The Sons of Angron have yet to see anyone outsmart a bolter shell.

The Sons of Horus are masters of all fields of warfare.  
The Sons of Angron leave all but the heart of the battle to those who follow behind them.

The Sons of Lorgar heap praise upon the Emperor's goals.  
The Sons of Angron worship only his methods.

The Sons of Vulkan carry with them to all places the hearthfires of Nocturne.  
The Sons of Angron care nothing for what is behind them.

The Sons of Corax strike without being seen.  
The Sons of Angron march with sound and thunder and fury.

The Sons of Alpharius ostentatious in their mystery.  
The Sons of Angron are believed too obvious to have secrets.


	12. Death of Chogoris

Angron studied the section of wood.

Right, so he was supposed to carve it into a momento for Chogris - a planet he had never visited - to give Jaghatai in a gesture of support. He didn't really feel particularly inspired, but Serenity had asked nicely.

After dulling his sword chipping away at the wood (and breaking three attempts when he chipped a little too hard) he went to Kharn and asked if it might not be easier to just sent Jaghatai a few hundred Traitor's heads and a few horses. He thought there was a planet in the nearest sector with fire-breathing horses, surely that would be more pleasing to his brother than some broken wood?

* * *

The thunder of World Eater feet across the decks of the alien vessel reminded Artai of the cavalry of Chogoris. But where his father's tuman, whether riders of the steppes or the Legion who wore the same alabaster armour and ceremonial scars that he did, would have circled their foes relentlessly, slicing off the weak and herding their foes like cattles, that was not the habit of the World Eaters.

Instead the Astartes in white and blue armour lunged directly at the heart of the defenders, intent upon smashing them and shattering their resistance. Artai had seen this before - seen the price it extracted in the form of scarred ceramite and torn flesh, but also the broken foes fleeing before the brutal certainty of a World Eater charge.

Here, as it had on all sorts of battlefields, it worked. At the centre of the vessel, behind layer after layer of armour intended to ward off the elemental fury of warship batteries, the command centre of the xenos vessel had no protection from the wrath of Angron's sons.

On other occasions Artai had stood back and watched, or held himself upon the flank, picking off stray warriors who sought to outflank the sudden advance. But now he found himself carried along with them, the long sleek chainsword he carried gripped in both hands for additional power as he hacked at the pirates in front of him as ferociously as the Astartes flanking him. At fourteen, he was tall for his age and had long since found himself towering over even grown men, saving for his father and uncles of course. Thus, Artai was scarcely smaller than the Astartes around him and the whining teeth of his blade cut as furiously as their heavy chain axes.

He didn't see the faces in front of him. The Eldar whose precise swordsmanship was no defense against overwhelming strength had a pale, amost cadaverous face to his eyes.

When Artai broke the nose of a human traitor with the guard of his sword, the gaudy carapace armour might have been midnight blue power armour for all he could tell.

And for a long moment as he broke into the command deck, the banner across the back seemed to mock him by resembling a winged skull. The sight froze him for a single, near-fatal instant as the huddle of pirate leaders opened up at him from behind the cover of their consoles. Stubber and laser fire scarred but did not breach his armour but scattershot from a crude cannon managed to catch the face of his helm and Artai staggered, one eyepiece broken and the armour-glass in his face.

Then a powerful hand shoved him forwards and to one side, opening the way for Kharn to lead the charge onwards, bolt pistol roaring as he picked off shooters and a power axe singing in his other hand in readiness for bloodshed ahead.

Artai drove his chainsword into the nearest chair, the teeth biting through padding and frame before he cut the power and started to wrestle off his helm. Free to smell the stench of blood and battle, not only from the compartment but also the rainbow of gore from dozens of disparate alien foe that painted his armour, he bent over and retched before starting to reach for his face.

"WAIT FOR AN APOTHECARY," ordered Angron bluntly. "LOSE AN EYE IF YOU FIDDLE BLINDLY WITH THAT. PROMISED YOUR FATHER TO KEEP YOU INTACT FOR A FUNERAL EVEN IF I COULDN'T KEEP YOU ALIVE."

He swallowed and then looked up at his uncle. "You're not...?" It was most unlike the Primarch not to be in the thick of the fighting, still going on.

Angron looked down at him and then shrugged. "YOU ARE BEGINNING TO UNDERSTAND OUR ANGER, SON OF KHAN. NOW YOU MUST MASTER YOUR OWN."

"My... own...?"

His response was a sharp nod but his uncle surprised him by doffing his own battlehelm. "REVENGE FOR CHOGORIS IS [I]NECESSARY[/I]. I DO NOT DO [I]ONLY[/I] THAT WHICH IS NECESSARY." His lips parted in a savage smile and to his surprise, for the first time since the news of Chogoris and of Aunt Esin, Artai returned it.

* * *

Jaghatai Khan was waiting in in the landing bay as the white Thunderhawk with blue trim entered the compartment. Through boots that were magnetically locked to the deck he felt the hammerblow of the assault craft's landing. Stormbirds had become increasingly uncommon sights among the Legions but Grand Companies could usually find one or two if necessary. Transporting a Primarch was usually considered good grounds but he doubted Angron cared - actually, he suspected his brother had simply boarded the nearest craft to the landing bay hatch on the Strike Cruiser that had brought him to this rendevous and wouldn't have cared if it was Stormbird or a boarding torpedo.

The assault ramp lowered and Angron walked out, followed by a dozen World Eaters with the markings of Captains. The Khan did not see Kharn - no doubt commanding the Legion in his lord's absence - but he recognised the markings of 11th Company, still commanded by Dreagher. But Jaghatai was not looking for old comrades: to his disappointment none of those white suits of armour bore the lightning bolt of the White Scars.

It had been ten years. Had Artai not been able to drag himself away from the battlefield? Or... He shook aside the dark thought. Angron was brutal, certainly, but not cruel. He would not keep further tragedy from a father out of thoughtless desire to guard him from grief. More probably, Artai would simply be aboard a later transport.

"Well met, brother," he voxed, raising his voice to be heard over the air rushing into the bay.

Angron took one gauntleted hand away from the hilt of his sword in greeting. "I'M MISSING A WAR FOR THIS. WHAT'S WRONG NOW?"

The Primarch spread his hands. "Roboute convinced Father to call a conference. The full Terran Council, the old War Council and a lot of the younger ones. Then She-Who-Must-Be-Heeded decided there should be a ball..."

"...WHAT SORT OF BALL?" Angron asked, gesturing with his hands to suggest dimensions of something small and spherical.

"A party, Angron."

"IN A BALL?"

Jaghatai was distracted from clarifying for his brother, who he suspected was playing dumb for the sake of his nascent sense of humour rather than genuinely ignorant (then again, Angron did get hit on the head a lot) when one of the World Eater Captains stepped forward and held out both hands. The Khan had placed his own arms over them, each with hands against the other's elbows, in the traditional Chogoris greeting before he thought to wonder why a World Eater would make such a gesture.

"Are you well?" he asked in his native tongue, suspicion beginning to cross his mind.

The Captain nodded sharply. "I am well. Father."

And Captain Artai of the 19th Company, World Eaters Legion then endured the indignity of being picked up and hugged in front of his peers.


	13. Senshi Minoris

_A/N: It seemed reasonable that after the original Senshi, each associated with a planet of the Solar System, that other planets might gain Senshi. Indeed, the Emperor engineered this. Granted, Senshi Baal, aka Nefer, didn't quite go to plan, but many lessons were learned and the perfected process was eventually applied elsewhere. Here are my snippets for this continuity._

_And yes, I went strange places with Night Haunter._

* * *

"So brother, do we get to meet the new addition to our family?" Vulkan asked after the obligatory formalities had been exchanged.

Roboute's honour guard of Ultramarines was precisely the same size as the detachments of their own Legions that Vulkan and Sanguinius had brought so the landing bay was now a mix of blue, green and crimson as the three groups intermingled, veterans seeking out old acquaintances from their brother legions.

The Ultramarine Primarch nodded calmly. "Of course, Vulkan. I apologise that she was not here to greet you."

"I hope that she is well?" Sanguinius' voice held a trace of concern. Not all the Senshi Minorus had been found untouched by the enemies of the Imperium.

"Quite well, yes." Their brother paused in evident consideration of how to express his next thought. "She is merely..." There was a crackle of almost entirely inaudible sound from the speaker built into the collar of his armour. "Ah. She's arriving now."

The three Primarchs moved out of the compartment, leaving their Astartes to continue getting reacquainted. No sooner had the doors opened then a distant but approaching sound caught the attention of both new arrivals.

"Imlateimlateimlatesorryimlateimlatei..."

It sounded like a voice - human, female, perhaps somewhat breathless.

The source arrived all of a sudden, darting around them towards the door.

"Sorryexcusemelategotto..."

She was human, dressed in a long blue silken tunic of the kind common to Ultramar fashion, in Vulkan's limited experience of his brother's realm. Long blonde hair was tied up in two ponytails, evident imitation of Serenity's preferred style (not at all uncommon). She'd also been moving almost as fast as some of Vulkan's slower astartes (More impressive than it sounded).

The girl drew herself up, back to the primarchs, straightened her tunic and the large bouquets of red, green and blue-headed flowers she bore, then prepared to enter the compartment that they had just left.

Roboute cleared his throat, very gently.

She froze and turned her head, very slightly, to see who she had just run past. A distinct reddening of her cheeks took place.

"My brothers, may I present to you Senshi Macragge," Roboute intoned formally.

Both Primarchs bowed deeply to the girl. "It is a great pleasure to meet you," Sanginius said in his most charming voice. Vulkan rolled his eyes. No doubt his winged brother would inadvertantly spark off another teenage crush.

Macragge swallowed and held up the bouquets like a shield to block off her face. "Um... haha... er... Welcome to Macragge! I brought you flowers! I was... um... picking them for you and... lost track of time." Yes, there was that crush.

Kindly, Sanginius let her off the hook. "What lovely flowers." He accepted one and sniffed at them. "The scent is delightful."

Vulkan could now see a very obvious redness in Macragge's cheeks. Although... He blinked. She was looking at him, not Sanginius. Avoiding the gaze of her new idol perhaps?

Then Senshi Macragge stepped quickly towards the Primarch of the Salamanders and placed the other bouquet in his hands before staring up at his black face with her huge blue eyes. "Oh wow, they really glow..." She murmured in wonder.

Roboute Guilleman, Master of Ultramar, Primarch of XIII Legion started chewing on his lower lip rather than laugh at the perplexed look on Vulkan's face.

* * *

Serenity found Echo curled up in a corner of one of the many defensive walls of the Imperial Palace, shaded from the harsh light of Sol by one of the crenellations. The small Senshi didn't look up when the Anima sat crosslegged in front of her, deliberately turning her head to avoid meeting her eyes.

Any hesitation on Serenity's part would have been impossible for anyone but those who knew her best to detect as she placed an open tub of ice cream Echo's line of sight. There was a spoon thrust into it, slipping slightly as the frozen contents slowly thawed under the hot sun. "Quadruple chocolate extreme," the blonde promised. She pulled out a second tub for herself and brandished the spoon militantly. "Mint chocolate, orange chocolate, dark chocolate and white chocolate with chips of milk chocolate." One thrust of the spoon produced a mouthful, balancing it in front of her eyes for a moment. "There are enough calories on this spoon to feed a guardsman on active duty for a standard day."

Echo could not help but watch as the morsel disappeared between Serenity's lips. She looked down at the tub in front of her. It looked awfully tempting.

"What are you waiting for?" Serenity asked curiously, digging out a second spoonful for herself. "There are billions... trillions... of children who will never even see a bowl of this." A tear seemed to form at the corner of her eye at the very thought. "You owe it to every one of them to enjoy it on their behalf."

Very carefully, Echo pulled out the spoon. It was marked with a light crusting of the ice cream. Delicately she licked at it. Her eyes went wide at the taste.

Serenity grinned. "If you don't want it..."

Echo hugged the tub to her with one hand and used the spoon to tear free a chunk the size of a fist. The fist of an Astartes, not her own rather diminutive hand.

Lesser beings might have doubted that she could have eaten such a mouthful in one go, but she was Senshi of Nocturne, Apprentice of the Lord of the Salamanders, disciple of Serenity in the ancient art of ice cream devouring.

The tub didn't stand a chance.

"She's all wrong for him," Echo murmured a little later. She hadn't been asked why she had found a quiet corner to curl up. Serenity, now draped across a couch on one of the balconies overlooking the gardens, was playing idly with a lock of the Senshi Minoris' hair. This was fairly easy since Echo was sitting with her back against the piece of furniture. The intimacy simply invited explanation of the previous circumstances.

Serenity hmmed non-commitally.

"Aurelia's Senshi of Macragge," continued Echo. "So she's got to be there almost all of the time and he will spend all his time on Nocturne with me -" Not that that was a bad thing. "- or on campaigns somewhere. Even when she visits, she'll only see him if he's there."

"Well she could see you as well," pointed out Serenity. "She visits you even when Vulkan isn't on Nocturne."

"It's not the same."

They watched below, where Vulkan (wearing the tunic of a noble Macragge gentleman) was listening intently to Aurelia Flavia's explanation of the histories behind the flowers surrounding the nearest water feature. The Senshi of Macragge was wearing traditional Nocturne garb that Echo had given her as a gift some years ago.

Serenity tugged lightly on the hair. "And now that I think about it, don't you spend almost every waking moment in Vulkan's forge when he's on Nocturne?"

Echo pulled the hair out of the Anima's grip before flushing slightly at the over-reaction. "I'm working!"

"Hmm. So you're not jealous that they're spending a little of their time with each other as well as the lots and lots of time that they both spend with you."

"It's not about being jealous."

"Ah." The Emperor's daughter smiled broadly. "Then it must be because she's your sister and he's your Primarch and you have icky thoughts about what they might get up to when you're not there as their chaperone."

Echo upended one of the empty ice cream tubs over Serenity's head at that point and the Princess wore it like a crown for the rest of the evening, to the amusement of the rest of the family.

* * *

Adama Oriente almost swallowed his tongue as part of his dressing room ceiling seemed to unfold into a Primarch. A Primarch in midnight-blue armour very very familiar to him.

There was barely room in the small room for Adama in his faux-Night Haunter costume (fortunately he wasn't wearing it as the stains resulting from this surprise would ruin his reputation). Adding the [I]real[/I] Konrad Curze in his power armour crammed it beyond belief.

"Ah uh eh..." the actor stammered while the Primarch waited patiently for him to wind down.

Curze raised two fingers. "Firstly, hold your elbows higher when you're throwing a punch," he ordered. "I am aware that you are only an actor but it's just sloppy."

"I-I-I will do that."

"Good." One mammoth finger folded down and Curze examined it as if lost in thought. Trying to remember what the other item of business was? The fact he was offering advice suggested he didn't actually object to the show...

Then a small book was offered, open to a blank page, along with a pen. "My sister would like your autograph." Another hesitation. "Sign the next page too."

Adama decided not waste time wondering who the second autograph was for and quickly scribbled his usual autograph on two successive pages. The book closed and was quickly folded away.

"ORIENTE! YOU'RE DUE ON SET IN FIVE!" came a call from outside. The actor's head whipped around towards the door and then he looked back towards Night Haunter.

Or at least to where the Primarch had been.

He was alone in the room.

"...did I just imagine that?" he wondered.

* * *

In retrospect, asking Angron's advice was a mistake.

"I SEE THE PROBLEM," he boomed when Sanguinius had finished laying out the situation with Nefer. "I CAN TAKE HER IN HAND IF YOU LIKE."

A nasty suspicious voice inside the Blood Angel Primarch's mind (it sounded like Kharn) prompted him to ask: "With the specific goal of..."

"WHEN I'M DONE WITH HER, SHE'LL KNOW HOW TO TEAR A BUILDING APART PROPERLY."

Angron, it appeared, did not see the problem. Sanguinius expanded on his explanation of why Nefer destroying sources of pornography was a bad... was not entirely a good thing.

"I REALLY DON'T SEE WHY IT BOTHERS YOU. MORTARION EXPLAINED THIS PEDO BUSINESS TO ME YEARS AGO AND IT SOUNDS AS IF NEFER HAD THE RIGHT IDEA."

Then he had to deal with three World Eater scouts sneaking aboard the battle barge to provide Nefer with a Flamer and a list of targets.

* * *

Konrad didn't smile when he heard about the fiery inferno that had once been home to the infamous 'Overlords of the Imperium' doujin circle. Nor did he snicker about the fact that Sanguinius' (who had managed to disprove his alibi for the previous assault upon the building and intercept him after recognising that it was Adama Oriente sitting in the Night Lords command centre) own Senshi was doing the burning.

Konrad was very tempted, but he did not. However it was a very merry Night Lords Primarch who snuck through the side corridors of one of the Night Lords strike cruisers and slunk into the shadows of an officially disused cargo hold. There was nothing criminal going on in the room. Sanguinius, if aware, could not even complain.

No one saw the Night Haunter place the artwork provided to him by Senshi Nocturne upon the table, but the legion serfs running the printing press knew what to do with it.

Within forty-eight hours of the cruiser's next call at a port, a new doujin was circulating through the Imperium. There were no identifying marks to associate it to previous work from the same source but collectors would undoubtedly guess that it was another Troll Work.

The cover showed Senshi Nefer of Baal in suggestively ripped uniform, supported in the arms of Furia with the looming shadows of two powerfully built Astartes looming over them both (one of the Astartes had wings). Fetish fuel.

The contents however, provided a far different tale. A compelling and superbly drawn story of how Nefer was put through mental anguish through the abuse of hir image, and how with the aid of Furia, Sanguinius and Angron, zhe was able to express hir feelings by ripping apart the foul, chaos-corrupted cults who had drawn exploitative artwork of hir. Any resemblence of the cultists to well-known doujin artists was uncoincidental.

Back in his private chambers - concealed beneath his official personal chambers - Night Haunter sat back behind his desk and reached for the next report. Then he set it down, straightened slightly the framed picture on his desk and smiled thinly before resuming his duties.

In the picture, he loomed uneasily behind a sofa on which sat Senshi Nocturne and a proud but nervous Nefer.

* * *

Konrad Curze had never been so certain in all his days that he was doomed.

It wasn't as if he didn't like Nefer. He would go so far as to say that he more than approved of hir. He'd been a little dubious about the Senshi Minoris project, particularly given the relatively negative reports on the first of the new Senshi, but it hadn't really been an issue until Jaghatai and Vulkan asked him to assist Senshi Baal Primus with the training of the new Senshi Nocturne.

It had been a half-baked plan to convince Jaghatai's daughter Aydilge of his trustworthiness. Doomed to failure, of course, but no one listened to him.

He'd been struck by two things about Nefer at the time. Firstly that zhe cared about the younger Senshi. Secondly that however unoffensive Nefer might be, there was nothing wrong with her defensiveness. As Aydilge found out the hard way, anyone approaching Nefer's charge with a weapon drawn was going to be put down, hard. (The daughter of the Khan survived the encounter, but her pride took an even more substantial beating than her body). Konrad hadn't had to lift a finger.

And then there were cookies, but that was entirely secondary.

Konrad had remained in an assisting role with the other Senshi Minoris as his other responsibilities permitted. He'd considered the relationship with Nefer to be a comfortable one. Certainly not an intimidating one.

Except that Sanguinius had spent most of a day making suggestions how to approach Nefer on an entirely different level and almost every word was sparking off new visions of how these strategms would fail. Disasterously. At best he could expect to be blasted vigorously (a relatively trivial threat, to his mind) by the unnerved Senshi. At worst...

It wasn't that he didn't like the idea of Nefer being at home in some cozy corner of his Battle Barge. Of Nefer making both of them a home there, or on New Nostramo once the planet came together again. The idea was alien to his upbringing on the streets of Nostramo but certainly appealing. He just didn't see most of what the winged Primarch was saying as leading to that as an outcome.

And so, paralyzed by a multitude of choices that he knew were bad, he said nothing as he offered the flowers. (Lilies, he had insisted, rather than the roses Sanguinius had been about to order. Nefer liked lilies.)

"I, am a man." Nefer pointed out.

Konrad was aware of this. He was a little uncertain as to how this would interact with what he was trying to work towards, although given that he hadn't actually mentioned anything of that goal to Nefer it was understandable that zhe might not be on the same page as him. He was also deeply inclined to murder Sanguinius for pushing him into this clearly disasterous confrontation. He said nothing.

"Thank you for the flowers. I like them."

...wow. Apparently not saying anything had been an acceptable solution. Splendid.

"There's a re-run of Saga of the Angry One this afternoon," he suggested. "We could watch that in the kitchen and make cookies for Echo." That sounded like a properly masculine activity to him, which might reassure Nefer.

* * *

The Night Lords were not used to formal drill so their march towards the private chambers of their Primarch followed their more typical movement patterns. Which was to say that they skulked through the ship, buckets of soapy water and mops in hand.

Like most command ships, the quarters of the Primarch were spacious. In fairness, given the sheer scale on which they had been designed, they rather had to be. Night Haunter, on receiving the ship, about a thousand years ago (give or take) had remodelled it upon the lines of his palace on Nostramo, which had been designed so that he could observe those within but that they couldn't find him unless he wanted them to.

It gave Roboute Guilleman a headache the first time he visited. The second time he'd brought a tape measure and some paper to map it out. He'd left eighteen hours later swearing that walls were moving (they didn't at the time, although Konrad had concluded it was a good idea and added the feature later) and that Konrad was stealing pages of his notes (guilty as charged).

It was a bachelor's room, but Konrad didn't actually live in it. He'd taken over a barracks the deck below and used a private stair to move between them. His most private rooms, of course, he kept acceptably tidy himself. His public rooms, he didn't trust anyone but himself to clean but could rarely be bothered.

As a result, the Night Lords proceeded with only slightly less caution in cleansing the network of rooms than they would have in cleansing a space hulk. No one even considered suggesting the use of serfs. (The traps would probably have killed them outright).

Konrad was pleased to see that he had a kitchen. No cutlery, admittedly, but it was easy enough to rectify. And Talos was on hand to patch up the unfortunate Sergeant Vandread who was incautious in opening the cabinets.

Eventually a new strategy was elected upon. With Konrad's permission and careful use of mops to check for mines, the assembled Astartes managed to shove anything movable out of a half-dozen rooms and the corridors around them. Then they set out to refurnish the rooms while Konrad secured all the other doors.

Then he very carefully unsecured a couple of the doors. He'd still need to access his real rooms after all. It was because of this that he didn't learn about the immense, heart-shaped bed that Sergeant Vandread had bought for him, forging Talos' name on the receipt, until it was already in place.

* * *

The Eldar have a series of jokes about the Imperial Royal Family. Most of them start along the lines of : A Primarch and a Senshi walk into a bar.

It wasn't quite as funny when it happened to Ci fon o, who was drowning his sorrows in a bottle of wine that predated human civilisation. He'd been saving it for the celebration of some spectacular triumph, but the crashing down of all the hopes and dreams of his current path also seemed a suitable occasion.

Seeing the Night Haunter walk into the bar, trailed by the brightly uniformed Senshi Nocturne (red and yellow bows, green skirt) carrying a small crib, wasn't enough to convince Ci fon o to abandon consumption of the bottle's contents.

Having them sit at his table was unexpected.

"You are the one they call World-builder," the Primarch growled.

Ci fon o stared up at him. "That's right. Ci fon o, devisor of wonders and maker of maiden worlds sits before you. Now if you'll excuse me, the wine and I are getting better acquainted."

The Night Haunter reached out with more speed than the eldar had credited the mon-keigh demi-god with, plucking the bottle from his hands. "I heard your proposal to construct an entire planetary enviroment suitable for the refugees of Altanar was rejected. A shame."

"Yes yes, a footnote in history." Ci fon o shook his head. "There was a time when the Eldar create such works of art on a whim. Now... we think too small."

Senshi Nocturne sniffed the air, flavored by the wine, and gave Night Haunter a dubious look. He nodded confidently and the Senshi leant forwards. "Master Ci fon o, we have a commission for you. It requires engineering skills of a kind not seen since the high days of our race and financial resources that do not currently exist."

Ci fon o studied them. He had never walked the path of a seer, but one did not need to have in order to realise that destiny followed all three humans closely. "That must be quite a problem."

"It is one that must be dealt with in great confidence," Nocturne admitted.

Night Haunter placed the bottle back on the table, stood and stared around the bar. "In one hundred seconds I will kill anyone in this bar who isn't part of our conversation."

"You can't do that!" protested a bartender with more limbs than sense. His shoulder exploded as a bolt shell intersected it, sending three arms spinning through the air to devestate a rack of bottles.

Ninety seconds later the room appeared empty. Night Haunter fired twice into the daring pair of apparent drunkards who had presumed to hide and spy on the conversation.

Ci fon o silently pushed the cork back into the bottle and wished he was more sober. "What is this about?"

Nocturne touched the small child inside the crib. "How much do you know about the Senshi?"

"Assume I know nothing." The eldar was all business now, a remarkable transformation.

"Each of us draws our power from a particular world. In my case Nocturne." She withdrew her hand. "Konrad has foreseen that this child will be Senshi Nostramo, protector of his homeworld."

"And you need me because..."

"Nostramo was destroyed many years ago," rumbled Night Haunter.

"Oh."

"We desire that you build a New Nostramo," the Senshi explained.

Ci fon o nodded slowly. "That will require a considerable organisation."

"It will be necessary to build that as well."

"Ah." The eldar leant over and looked at the infant mon-keigh girl. No, infant human girl. Best to keep that straight now. "I suppose I shall have to learn your language then."

Nocturne smiled. Night Haunter extended one heavily armoured hand. Ci fon o knew this human custom. He bowed and kissed the gauntlet's knuckle. The Senshi of Nocturne giggled, for no reason he could understand.


	14. The Fulgrimite Heresy

_A/N: In one Lovehammer continuity, Beryl is also reborn, falls to Chaos and is smitten by Angron. These sections are more or less in continuity for that arc and include the only occasions where Angron and Beryl crossed paths. They also include crossing back to the original source materials._

* * *

Russ directed a glare at Angron.

It wasn't that he disliked his brother. To the extent alliances were necessary within their family, Angron was by temprement naturally suited to be one of his. It was nice to have someone else play the savage barbarian in comparison to the Space Wolves, candidates for which were not overwhelming. And the cartoon was hilarious, not that he'd admit to watching it.

No, Russ had only one major point of contention with Angron.

"We need to talk."

Angron gave him a look that suggested talking to Russ ranked somewhere below having a tooth-pulled in his priorities, but he drained the mug of mjod that Thora had provided him with and followed his brother out into the snow.

They walked a good long distance from the entrance to the Fang, what Russ privately considered 'safe range' and then a bit further just be sure.

"Don't look at her again."

Angron didn't pretend ignorance of whom Russ was speaking but the look that he directed at his brother suggested that his ire was real this time. "Why not?"

Russ growled deep in his throat. "She is... mine." His eyes locked on Angron, an alpha defying a younger wolf to rise up in challenge.

For a very long moment the threat of violence hung between them.

Angron's hand moved to his hip and for a moment Russ thought that he was going for his sword. He reached for his own frostblade, pausing only when he saw the anticipation in Angron's eyes. "No," he said, seeing that Angron's hand had instead simply been reaching for his helm. "I will not give you the excuse."

The other primarch lifted the helmet up and held it over his head, the brim level with the bottom of his blunt nose. "Leave," he grunted. "I know the way." Then he brought the helm down and sealed it to the rest of his armour.

Hours later, when he lay on thick furs alongside Thora, Russ felt the first pangs of guilt.

"Did I offend him somehow?" she asked him. "To leave so suddenly."

"It's just his way," Russ assured her and started to ransack his brain for possible women he could set Angron up with. The galaxy was vast and somewhere across it there must be a woman who would be right for his brother. Just... not Thora.

* * *

Cadia was an empty world. All the indicators suggested that it was an ideal planet for humankind and in the absence of man would surely have been selected for colonisation some form of xenos. Instead only a single corner of the world was home to anyone at all. Small, almost unnoticeable tribes of primitive humans that never strayed from their tiny refuge.

But now that he was on Cadia's surface, Kharn no longer wondered why no one had colonised the planet. In fact, he could only wonder that the tribes continued to survive on the howling wasteland and what reason his lord had for summoning him to this distant corner of the galaxy.

Not just him, either. From warzones scattered across entire segementum, out of scores of expeditionary fleets, the World Eaters were assembling. A detachment here, a company there. Four grand companies, a total force of almost five thousand, that had been serving under the Warmaster's command. Kharn himself had been overseeing recruitment from the dregs of a hiveworld halfway to Ultramar and had arrived with four dozen neophytes in tow.

The skies over Cadia were full to bursting as XII Legion ships jostled for postion in the orbtials, their captains as direct and forthright as the World Eaters that they transported. And on a barren, windswept plain, Thunderhawks and Stormbirds were delivering those Astartes to stand in grand parade. It was over a hundred years since Kharn's legion had come together in one place and in those days they were far fewer. Over forty thousand strong, they formed up a line a dozen deep that stretched for ten kilometers. At their back and their flanks were armoured vehicles, the transports and weapon platforms that supported them in battle.

A few old officers, like Kharn himself, walked the lines to seek out old friends among the veterans. One, standing at the very front, did not.

Primarch Angron stood, arms crossed, with his back to the legion.

It wasn't until Kharn reached the front rank that he saw the Astartes at Angron's side. Alone in the see of blue and white, this one wore rich purple battleplate, a slim blade more suited to a duellist than a soldier at his hip.

"My lord," the equerry greeted his primarch, stepping up to reclaim his place at Angron's right hand from this interloper.

Angron did not turn his head. "Kharn."

The purple-clad Astartes wore the heraldry of the 13th Company of the Emperor's Children, Kharn realised as the younger warrior turned to face him. But what was he doing here? The Phoenican and Angron were hardly close. "Captain Kharn," the Emperor's Child greeted him with a shallow bow. "It is an honour. I am Captain Lucius."

Kharn had heard of this young pup. It was claimed that he was unrivalled with the sword. However, the slight unevenness of his nose suggested that someone had demonstrated already that a fist was just as viable as a weapon. Pity it hadn't knocked some of the arrogance out of him. "Likewise." He stepped forwards, pushing into Lucius' personal space. "I have legion business with the Primarch. Excuse me."

Lucius' eyes flickered to Angron's face and whatever he saw there convinced him not to argue. He donned his helmet. "Of course," he agreed and gestured out onto the plain where Kharn's enhanced eyes could barely make out a tiny village of the local barbarians. "I'll check on their progress."

Angron waited until the interloper was almost by not quite out of hearing before glancing sideways at Kharn. "Tactiful of you," he spat in a contemptuous tone that passed for sarcasm when he spoke.

"Why are we here, Lord Angron?"

The primarch frowned in thought, trying to put his motive into words. "Who am I, Walkuf?" he snarled at last.

Kharn blinked. "Walkuf?" he asked incredulously. "What has that... children's entertainment to do with this."

"Everything!" Angron roared and then clenched his fist in front of his face. "Or nothing," he added in a more reasonable voice.

A dozen sarcastic replies crossed Kharn's mind but he didn't bother. Angron could manage sarcasm on his own part bat his record of recognising it from others was spotty at best. "That isn't very clear, master."

"Am I... one of those stuffed toys?" Angron asked slowly, apparently straining to get the question out. "Or a mindless dog like Walkuf's Angry One?"

For the first time, Kharn regretted his participation in that project. It had seemed harmless enough at the time. "You are a warrior, Lord Angron. The greatest in all the Imperium."

"Hmph. And when this Great Crusade is over? What use the warrior when the Imperium is one of my sister's tea parties."

Kharn shook his head helplessly, unsure what to say.

"That is what I am here for. To find out."

"And what about him?" Kharn pointed at Lucius' back. "What his role here?"

Angron shrugged his massive shoulders. "What's the word? Someone who goes before."

"Prophet?"

"Do I look like Urizen?"

"No, lord. A guide, perhaps?"

The primarch shook his head and then froze in recollection. A grim smile returned to his face. "I remember now. He's here as a mine detector."

Lucius was trailed by a violet eyed woman when he returned from the village. Angron, apparently in good humour, nudged Kharn with his elbow. The blow impacted the equerry's ear but he was used to that. "He's got a girlfriend!" the primarch declared in apparent surprise. "I thought his legion were all queer for Fulgrim."

"Most amusing, master," Kharn replied drily, although his lips quirked.

"Angry One," the woman said, going to her knees and genuflecting in front of Angron. His fists clenched and Kharn heard ceramite cracking. He also suspected he saw a smirk on Lucius's lips.

Angron studied his hands, grunted and removed the broken gauntlet from his left hand. "Damn cartoon," he mumbled and then looked down. "Get up, I can't see you properly lying down like that."

Lucius gestured to the woman as she stood. "This is Ingethel. She has been expecting us."

"The god-walkers spoke," Ingethel confirmed. "And the warchiefs heeded them when they said you would come. A man from the stars, a man of great strength. The one who will tear the stars from the skies and tread the thrones of the gods beneath his armoured feet."

Angron spat into the dirt and then pointed with his remaining gauntlet at Lucius. "This one also spoke to me of everlasting glory. Words are cheap."

Her violet eyes were... strange, Kharn thought. Had they been described then he might have thought them to be like those of Mortarian's ward, but these were different. Almost... alien. Her clothes were tanned, some kind of leather? Human skin he thought.

"I shall show you the reality. Come with me, Angron. Your armies have devoured first cities and then entire worlds. Now all of the galaxy shall fall to you."

The primarch crossed his arms over his chest and glared at her. Like few others could, Ingethel met his gaze.

"Kharn. At my orders," Angron growled.

"Yes lord."

"Lucius. At my heel."

"I..." the Emperor's Child seemed unsure of the terse order's meaning but he was addressing empty air for Angron was already striding towards the village, barely moderating his pace enough for Ingethel to keep up at a run.

Kharn's lips drew back in contempt. "He means that you follow him." Like a dog, he added mentally.

* * *

The sun had set, chilling the winds even more. Still the World Eaters stood in their ranks, uncomplaining. Not because of orders. No order had been given to keep them from breaking ranks if they so chose. Some did, taking brief moments to see to their gear. This was not a parade. It was simply a wait, something that the legion was well used to. A lull that preceded the inevitable: sweet, sweet violence.

The World Eaters did not need the regimented discipline of the Ultramarines or the Imperial Fists. Nor did they seek refuge in the rough camarderie of the Space Wolves or White Scars. All they needed was readiness to kill. Disappointly, that was often enough to convince human opposition to surrender. They had that sort of reputation.

It was sometime after local midnight that Lucius came staggering back to their lines, his face white.

"Is something the matter?" asked Dreagher, whose company waited there. His Astartes looked at their purple-clad cousin and one of them muttered an ancient word that they had learned from the Primarch. From the dialect of the long destroyed city of Desh'ea, it translated as 'sissy'.

"There was screaming," Lucius whispered under his breath. "And... things." He was actually swaying.

"'Things'?" the Captain of the 11th Company replied, incredulously.

Lucius nodded vigorously and gestured with his hands as if trying to describe something. He failed. "Stuff," he said as if that clarified anything. "I should go back."

Dreagher had fought alongside III Legion before. He didn't recall their Captains being such sissies before. "You are back."

"Oh. Good." Lucius fell over.

It was only now that Dreagher saw that a rather large wooden stake had been driven through the back of his armour and up into his chest. Well that made a bit more sense, although the idiot should probably have reported that first. "You two," he indicated two of his World Eaters. "Take him to the apothecary's Rhino." Then he activated his vox. It was Kharn's job to deal with this sort of crap.

* * *

At dawn the next day Kharn led an advance party forwards to investigate what was happening at the village. Up close it looked even more primitive than he had at first presumed, little more than leather tents, many of which had evidently been on fire at some point during the night. At first glance there didn't seem to be anywhere intact enough to be disguising someone the size of a Primarch. (And even by that standard, Angron would be catagorised as extra-large).

Fortunately, the equerry had thought ahead and brought along an auspex. "You know, we really should have noticed these caves when we were deploying," he observed mildly.

"We did," Dreagher told him. "Our lines have covering fire of all the sections nearest to the surface in our general vicinity."

"Of course." Kharn scanned the area and then gestured to one of the tents. "Under there."

The passages that had been dug down into the ground were considerately large enough for a fully armoured primarch and therefore more than large enough for two Astartes to walk abreast. Whoever had dug them had also thought of the decoration, they were marked with carvings and mural of battle. Kharn couldn't help but admit as he and mired a crude but compelling depiction of World Eaters locked in battle against orks that they felt rather homey. Wait... why would primitive tribesmen paint World Eaters into their art before they had ever encountered them?

The artwork grew more disturbing as they marched deeper into Cadia, but somehow also more compelling. Other legions were depicted... but they weren't just fighting xenos. Other imperial elements were in conflict with them and Dreagher admitted to rather admiring what appeared to be Astartes triumphing over a giant warmachine before recognising the machine as an imperial titan marked as belonging to the Legion Mortis.

And then there were the portrayals of their primarch.

Angron, slaying what were recognisably Eldar.

Angron, locked in combat with warriors clad in the same blue as the armour of the Ultramarines Legion.

Angron, sat on a throne, someone chained before him.

Kharn paused and examined the latter picture because it showed signed of recent defacement. He couldn't make out who it was that was supposed to be his master's captive in the artwork, the stone had been smashed to render them unrecognisable. All he could make out for sure was long brown hair. Very strange.

Ultimately they found Angron after Dreagher heard echoes reminiscent of someone howling in fury. As they got closer Kharn recognised what was going on and called a halt. "I know what that is," he told them. "I'll go on ahead."

"What if the Primarch is locked in battle and needs us?"

Kharn shook his head firmly. "No. This isn't battle. There's no reason to expose you to this." He walked on, leaving a dozen confused World Eaters behind as he cursed himself for unleashing this horror on the universe.

He'd only had the best of intentions, trying to civilize his Primarch enough to interact with the rest of Imperial society. Sailor Neptune and Sailor Uranus still refused to forgive him, even after a hundred years.

The passage Kharn was following led into a larger cavern, this one decorated with dead bodies. There were numerous wooden stakes half-buried in the ground. Some of them had corpses jammed onto the other ends. The floor was covered in gore and sections of what was recognisably Angron's armour.

The Primarch himself sat unperturbed in the midst of the carnage, sewing together a sack of grey skin with a bone needle and what looked like human sinew. Worst of all, he was singing.

Some of the Primarchs were good singers. Sanguinius and Fulgrim notably, but even Leman Russ was said to have an excellent, if unpractised, baritone. Angron, putting it mildly, did not.

What was worse was that he enjoyed singing.

Probably because he knew how awful it sounded.

Fortunately, Angron broke off his song when Kharn set foot inside the chamber. "I left you with the Legion for a reason."

"I came after you for a reason."

The primarch snorted. "Fine. Pick up my armour then." He held out the bag and Kharn accepted it grudgingly. "It won't be long now."

"What won't be long?"

Angron's eyes blazed. "Until they come."

* * *

There was another army deploying onto the plains of Cadia when they reached the surface. They swarmed out of the hills as if the fleet in orbit had not done a deep scan of the area before landing the World Eaters. Soldiers and warmachines poured out, a host that dwarfed the World Eaters. Kharn squinted at them. Some of them were human, he thought. Many were not. And the warmachines ranged from a near match to those of the Imperial Army to the bizarre. An entire valley was clogged by what seemed to be giant scorpions of brass scuttling forwards.

In fact that was one matter of uniformity: almost without exception the hordes assembling in front of the World Eaters wore a mix of red and brass.

"Who are they? Where did they come from?"

Angron frowned. "I didn't ask."

"What?"

"It never came up." The primarch shrugged. His armour, rattled in the bag behind him. There hadn't been enough left for him to wear so he was walking back to his legion with nothing more than an improvised kilt to see to his dignity. Then again, he hadn't looked very different when Kharn first met him.

Kharn groaned. "But these are the ones that you're waiting for?"

"S'right."

"And what are they here for?"

Angron's smile was a terrible thing to behold. "Once I get my spare battleplate on, we can go over and you can ask them yourself."

Kharn blinked and then thumbed the activation rune on his axe, which roared to life reassuringly. "I suppose it's less distance to charge them."

"That's the spirit," laughed Angron.

The leader of the army was a giant in armour of brass, larger even than Angron. Unlike many of the leaders assembled around him - at least Kharn thought they were leaders, perhaps champions would be a more apt description - his proportions were broadly human. "I AM DOOMBREED, FAVOURED CHAMPION OF KHORNE!"

"Oh Serenity, there are two of them," Kharn whispered, earning himself a nasty look from Lucius, who had been patched up and insisted on following them to meet the army. "I am Kharn, Equerry to Angron!" he replied.

"IT ALWAYS PLEASES ME TO WELCOME A FELLOW HUMAN TO OUR RANKS. YOUR DEEDS WILL BE FELL AND GLORIOUS!"

"THEY HAVE BEEN SO FAR," Angron said, causing Kharn to blink as he realised he had been complimented. If it were possible he would have stood straighter.

"What brings you to Cadia?" asked Kharn.

"WAR!" Doombreed roared enthusiastically.

Angron nodded solemnly.

"ARE YOU PREPARED KINSMAN?" the giant demanded. "TO LEAD THIS WARHOST INTO EPIC CONFLICT, TO SPILL BLOOD FOR MY MASTER KHORNE AND TO HEAP SKULLS IN HIS HONOUR?"

Wait what?

Kharn looked over to his master, who drew his swords. "HOW CAN I REFUSE SUCH A CHALLENGE?"

Doombreed laughed. "I KNOW THE FEELING! IMAGINE IT, THE GALAXY AT OUR FEET, THE SLAUGHTER ONE THAT WILL BE SPOKEN OF IN HUSHED WORDS FOR A THOUSAND GENERATIONS!"

"IT WILL BE GLORIOUS,"Angron boomed. "THAT ONE -" he indicated Lucius "- SPOKE OF OATHS."

"INDEED." Doombreed gestured and two warriors - almost lizard like - dragged forwards a bundle. Using the butt of his axe he carved a rune in the barren soil between them in savage strokes. "HERE." He flung the bundle upon the ground, whipping away the blanket to reveal a child, a human child. "HER BLOOD SHALL SEAL THE COMPACT."

Angron stared down at the child, Kharn staring at him in horror. He couldn't really mean to do this, could he? "IT HARDLY SEEMS SUFFICIENT," the Primarch mused. "KHARN, KILL LUCIUS FOR ME."

Lucius, Captain of III Legion's 13th Company was possessed of superb, one might even say perfect reflexes. His power blade was out and he thrust it Kharn's chest, piercing his fellow Astartes' heart in a single lunge.

Then Kharn's fist closed around his opponent's wrist, pinning him in place. With his other hand, Kharn brought his axe down squarely upon the other Captain's helmet, the teeth of the chainaxe screaming as they tore through the ceramite armour. The noise was replaced by a slurping sound as they ripped almost without effort through the reinforced bone of skull and into the soft tissue of Lucius' brain. "My primarch, it is done."

The lord of the World Eaters lifted Lucius up over the rune and the child that squatted upon it. "THIS IS MORE WORTHY," he declared and tore open the astarte's battle plate, showering child and mark alike with blood and gore.

Doombreed threw back his head. "YES! MASTER IT IS DONE!" The planet itself seemed to shake in confirmation.

Kharn heard his vox chirp the code that to the educated ear of a Astartes indicated an override signal from the fleet above. "Extreme Predjudice to all command rank World Eaters. Multiple warp emergences, estimated to be space hulks."

"Lord..."

"I know." Angron picked up the bloodsoaked child, his voice lowered to normal conversational levels, and handed her to Kharn. "See to her. And yourself."

The querry grimaced, feeling the distant pain of his wound, dulled by the complex chemicals being poured liberally into him by the systems of his battleplate. "And you, lord?"

Angron turned away from him, which was answer enough. "THERE'S SOMETHING I MUST SAY TO YOU, DOOMBREED." Kharn, walking away from them heard another note from his vox. This one signified a vox override from Angron himself. He knew that the words about to be spoken would be heard by every World Eater - not only the Astartes but every man and woman in their service that was in the system.

Doombreed seemed not to notice this. "WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TO ME, BROTHER?"

In centuries of service Kharn had never heard Angron's voice so low, so sibilant, so filled with bloodlust. It was a veritable hiss as he whispered: "this is how i refuse." There was a crash of sword against axe as the startled Doombreed barely parried Angron's blazingly fast cutting stroke. "KILL THEM ALL!"

No other order was needed.

No other order was desired.

Without the slightest hesitation forty thousand World Eaters hurled themselves forwards, weapons raised.

"TREACHERY!" Doombreed's mighty axe smashed down on Angron, who met it force on force, blocking with one sword as he thrust the other towards the face of his enemy. The two giants duelled as their armies rushed together, screaming for blood, the World Eaters as enthused as their enemies.

"Damn you," Kharn whispered as he carred the child away. "Damn you Angron, for making me miss this."

* * *

With her nose buried in a medical journal the blue-haired Senshi barely noticed the woman running through the starboard gallery of the battle barge Extreme Prejudice. Under the circumstances, a woman running away made perfect sense: most people did when Angron sang in the shower.

Tekhne wouldn't be going in this direction at all if the Extreme Prejudice wasn't carrying a small library of obscure medical texts gathered from the recently pacified sectors of the Obscura region. In order to keep them safe, Angron had stored them next to his quarters. Fortunately, the belt of emergency supplies Perturabo had given her on their wedding anniversary contained ear plugs.

Her progress was interrupted when the woman grabbed her shoulders and started shaking her in hysteria. With a sigh, Tekhne looked up from her book and looked at her lips long enough to read the words that they were uttering.

"Here." With one hand she pulled out her spare earplugs and offered them.

Gratefully the other woman took them with her blue hand.

Tekhne blinked. Wait, what was that?

Thank you, thank you, she saw the lips say. I've never heard such horrible singing before.

Tekhne held up a hand, stepped back a bit and got a better look. Ah. That daemon bitch that hurt Fulgrim.

Beryl hugged the Senshi impulsively. Listen, Fulgrim needs help. I wanted to ask Angron but -

BLAM!

Tekhne's holdout boltpistol went skidding down the corridor as the recoil tore it from her hands. That kept happening - she'd ask Pertuarbo for a less powerful holdout if incidents like this didn't prove that she really needed it. Wait, what was that about Fulgrim?

* * *

Fulgrim looked up as the door opened. He wasn't expecting visitors, although Sanguinius might have returned earlier than expected. Then again, he didn't think that his winged brother would kick the door open again...

Oh.

Angron glared at his brother for a moment and then reached down and wrapped the fingers of one hand around the crown of Fulgrim's head. For a moment the tormented primarch couldn't help but shudder at the thought of those stained fingers touching his immaculate silver hair. Then he remembered that his hair wasn't exactly immaculate at the moment.

He didn't resist as Angron dragged him to his feet. "Get off your arse. Your legion need you."

It genuinely didn't occur to Fulgrim that maybe he should resist until he was being thrown face first at the wall. His nose broke. So did the brickwork.

"Are you crazy?" he exclaimed, trying to scramble back. "What are you -!?"

"They don't need you to be pretty. They don't need you to be sane..." A very nasty smile cracked Angron's lips as he grabbed Fulgrim by the ankle and hurled him across the room, breaking an abandoned attempt at taking up sculpture again. "My boys do fine with me."

Scrambling to his feet, Fulgrim jumped away from Angron, feeling his body moving in that same unnatural fashion... his vision blurred and when it cleared he got a very brief, very clear view of his brother's knuckles. And then his nose exploded in pain again.

Angron gave him a judicious look and then kicked him savagely below the ribs. This time, however, Fulgrim rallied and somehow turned his instinctive attempt to curl into a ball into a roll forwards and lashed out with one foot. There was a pained grunt and he looked to see that his heel had made crushing contact with his brother's groin. Angron's smile grew even wider. "They just need that."

He turned and walked away, apparently unconcerned by the kick. "Can't stay, got a rebellion to crush. Brought you something though."

The bag he produced from outside the door was clearly made by amateur hands. Fulgrim couldn't place the fabric though. "What's in made of?"

"Daemonhide." Angron answered absently. "First one that I..."

"Killed?" Alright, Fulgrim did NOT like the twinkle in Angron's eye at that suggestion.

"That too." He unfastened the neck of the bag and pulled a small... blue and white...

"I thought you hated those things?" Fulgrim exclaimed as he caught the Plushie Angron.

"S'right." Angron buckled up the bag and slung it over his shoulder. "Hear they're good against monsters under beds though."

And then he was gone and Fulgrim sat clutching the doll, laughing until he cried and crying until he laughed.

* * *

Russ stared at the picture. There was Thora. And there was a smaller, softer looking Thora.

There were all his sister's other guards as well, with their own strange-looking counterparts but...

Two Thoras.

That was... perfect.

"Thora," he asked calmly. "This... other you. Is she dating another me?"

"I don't think she has a man at all," Thora admitted. "Although it sounded like she wanted one."

Better than perfect.

"I need an Astropath." At long last Russ could be rid of his secret burden of shame. "Angron has to hear about this right away."

* * *

Beryl saw Angron at the gathering. He did not notice her.

Oh he saw her. Cold, bitter eyes measured her, calculated her threat and dismissed her.

There was a wide berth around him, no one seeking to approach the most notoriously short-tempered and violent of the Emperor's sons.

Beryl looked at him and remembered Angron, icon of the Imperium's children, patron of the Imperial Schola Program, consistently 'the Primarch I want to be like' among the under-13 age group across three Segmentum...

This Angron's blue and white armour did not have the clean lines she remembered. It was marked with chains and icons. She could see marks of cybernetic implants visible through the shaven skin over his skull and remembered that Serenity was said to have removed such cruel mechanisms from her brother when she first met him.

This is the price of your Fulgrim, a voice whispered to her. Pay it and be glad.

Between blinks Beryl saw Khorne's claws encircling Angron. Not yet closed, but ready to do so.


End file.
